Resident Evil: Demon Rising
by SSJ-Alhazred
Summary: Crossover fun. Guess what happens when Alucard wakes up in 1999?
1. Nocturne in the Moonlight

This one was inspired by some insane coincidences that make Castlevania and Resident Evil fit quite well together, although some are based on the rumors of what's going to happen in future Resident Evils. Spoiler warning goes for both series of games in general.

A character from Chrono Cross makes a guest appearnece; do not be confused if you spot her, it's just a cameo. And I freely admit to ripping off a line from Vampire Hunter D, a scene from the Matrix, and comic relief from the Mummy, just not in this part. See if you can catch 'em all later on.

Wouldn't you know I plan out the whole plot, and then the next day I find out that the RE: CV-Complete version {and yes, it's confirmed now} might destroy my continuity? Ah, well.

Special thanks go to Kreliana, Princess Artemis, Red XIII, Aren and Juu.

---

**Resident Evil: Demon Rising, part 1**

_Nocturne in the Moonlight_

---

_What am I doing..._ was all Maria Renard could think at the moment. Physically, it was obvious what she was doing. She was chasing after Dracula's son, a half vampire who wanted to sleep forever. And for some reason, she wanted to stop him.

Okay, so Richter at least didn't think there was some ulterior motive driving him. From the Belmont's records, Alucard had apparently turned sides long ago and his disloyalty to Dracula was absolute.

Maria had found Alucard rather attractive, but that wasn't her concern right now. She had to find him; he had helped her beyond belief at Castlevania, and at the very least he was a friend. He could have simply killed Richter if he wanted to. But he didn't. And right now, he was going to fall asleep for as long as possible again, and she just wasn't going to let that happen.

---

**Late 1998**

"It was a dark and stormy night…"

The tall suited man that whispered those words followed them with a laugh. He knew of their literary infamy, one of the many things he'd learned, one of the many trivial things.

Dark and stormy it was. He looked out the huge window from his office in the highest tower on the modernized castle, at the rain both pouring down the structure and onto the land and lake below.

He turned.

"Did you get it?"

"Of course," replied the room's other occupant. The other man's clothes attire looked war torn, but he himself was without a scratch. He pulled a small vial of purple liquid from a pocket in his vest and tossed it through the air.

The tall man caught it perfectly, and studied it for a few seconds. The purple was almost the same shade of his tie, but oh so much more valuable, and deadly, then the simple apparel.

"I should have thought of this 'double agent' thing years ago," the tall man said, a think European accent now noticeable in his voice. "Well done, Death, very well done indeed. Of course, it's not like a city of the dead would stop you, would it?"

"Of course not," was the reply. "In fact I rather enjoyed the environment. Frankly it's this appearance and name that annoys me more then anything, but… what's that human saying? You can't have an egg without breaking a few omelets?"

"Reverse it."

"It shows you how much I care," the shorter man chuckled. "I'll still need to give Umbrella a sample, though."

"A necessary sacrifice," the tall man replied, using what seemed like a simple slight of hand trick to make the vial vanish from sight. And then it reappeared, but now there were two of them, one in each hand. He tossed one back.

"Indeed, Death. And, if you are still keen on being patient for my plans, I have another task for you after you deliver that."

"Oh? Need Hunk to spy a little more?"

"No, no my friend. This is quite different, and at the same time familiar. You notice a certain someone hasn't been bothering us?"

"I know the Belmonts are finally gone," Hunk replied. "You mean… him?"

"Yes, yes him. I've been able to keep our presence from waking him all these years while we set up, but I think the time is right. I want you to find him, bring him to me. Maybe he'll side with us this time. If not… well, I will deal with him. And don't try this alone."

"Very well," answered Hunk. He promptly turned around and left, leaving Count Dracula to ponder the view once more.

"You know I always come back… but this time… I won't need to."

---

**January 8, 1999**

"Not rain… please, not rain…"

Claire Redfield prayed. She really did NOT want it to rain right now, in the middle of the night, when it was already cold. Damn, it was raining.

Europe was not making a good impression with her. All she wanted to do was walk to where her brother was waiting, it was not a long distance, maybe half a mile through thin woods outside of the city… she had a gun in case of trouble, too bad she hadn't thought of an umbrella. There was some irony, a helping umbrella.

A dog howled in the distance. This was ridiculous! It had gone from light shower to torrential downpour in about six seconds flat, and Claire was already soaked to the bone. Great.

Well, she certainly wasn't going to walk in this until it let down a little; at least, that's what she wanted. But to have this, she needed shelter.

_C'mon, there's always a cave or something in the woods... why can't there be one here? There'd BETTER be something around here..._

She looked around, shivering. Not good. Cold led to better chances of sickness, and sickness reminded her of nothing but Umbrella's screw-ups, the creatures they fondly made, and above all, those wretched zombies.

As luck would have it, the ground rolled into a hillside not thirty feet away, and sure enough, there was a small cave in the side. Claire broke into a run as that dog howled again. Funny, it seemed closer.

Be that as it may, a comforting sense of dryness welcomed her in the small cavern, which turned out to be not so small after all. A door was embedded into the back, thick and metal, like it was sealing off a mausoleum. Curious, Claire tested the door and, finding it unlocked, pulled it open.

Maybe this was a bad idea. For all she knew it was another one of Umbrella's hidden labs. Not very well hidden, though. Logic would dictate that she brave the rain and bring Chris back here, since the lab idea wasn't so farfetched, really. The thought of the rain pushed her further through the door.

The passageway was simple stone, with unlit torches lining the walls. So far so good, anyway. She searched her pockets for her lighter and, thankful that she'd remembered to buy a waterproof one, lit a torch. It illuminated the area around her perfectly, and she continued on with it in hand.

The sound of the rain outside was constant, it seemed that the hill wasn't very high to begin with. In fact, the only thing that had stayed in Claire's mind was the oddness of this weird, seemingly manmade tunnel.

She lit a torch every once and awhile to keep the whole place lighted, in case hers went out. The passageway was over soon, with another, larger door. This one opened too, this time into a chamber that stretched about twenty feet or so in length and width, with half of that for height. Similar torches lined the stone walls that she could see, as hers wasn't bright enough to illuminate the entire room at once. The middle seemed to have some kind of centerpiece, but Claire couldn't make it out in the dim light.

The rain was still pouring on the outside, so, having nothing better to do for a few minutes, Claire walked around and lit a few of the torches. The orange flames brought plenty of light to the chamber, enough to see that the 'centerpiece' was not one but two of what looked like coffins. Old, stone coffins, one of them with elaborate markings on it.

"Huh, guess it IS a tomb," Claire said to herself. How odd… it was good shelter, anyway.

Click... click...

Claire whirled around to face the door she had come through. She was fairly near it again, having lit the torches in a circle, but she opted to have some semblance of cover and positioned herself between the two coffins, since they were perpendicular to the door. Her mind placed the sound to two possibilities immediately. You just didn't hear that sound in nature, it was mostly unmistakable, but on the stone, her first guess might be wrong.

Click... click...

Claws… claws on the ground, with the wielder walking slowly. She'd never forget that, and she'd certainly never forget the distinctive variation of the sound that two of Umbrella's perversions shared.

Click... click...

Claire raised her gun; it was getting closer… closer… she tensed. It was right outside the door, and she knew very well what it was… but relief washed over her as the snout, and slowly after, the head and body of a near skinless dog crept around the curve just outside the doorway.

It wasn't a Licker; that was the important thing. She could kill it with her handgun, no sweat. Waiting for the dog to spot her, Claire aimed carefully and pulled the trigger. Her shot went wide and hit the thing in it's back rather then head, but it was still hurt.

It snarled and prepared to pounce. _Hell with it._

Tossing careful aim to the wind, Claire opened fire and sent bullet after bullet into the thing, each one knocking it back a little more, until finally it fell over and lay still, blood pouring from it's rotted flesh.

Lowering her gun, Claire let out a sigh. She should have aimed better on the first shot; it would've saved a lot of ammo. But at least she'd managed to slaughter the thing before it could touch her. The important thing was that it hadn't done so.

Click... click...

Not again.

Not moving from her 'cover,' Claire raised her gun again and prepared to catch the apparent second dog with a bullet, like the first.

But that wasn't going to happen. A loud BANG resonated throughout the tunnel and chamber, and Claire placed it as a heavier weapon then hers, maybe a shotgun. The second animal, indeed a dog, was knocked onto the body of the first by the blow. One side of it's head had been obliterated, and the clicking was replaced with a new sound; human footsteps.

And it was a normal human, at least not a shambling zombie. Of course, there wasn't any outbreak around here, as far as Claire knew. It made the dogs seem a little out of place. Be that as it may, she held her gun high in case her 'savior' turned out to be someone hostile. She half expected another William Birkin, while hoping it was Chris coming to her rescue.

But it was just a human, as was apparent when he stepped around the corner, a human wearing a helmet with infrared goggles, and armor with Umbrella's logo on it, exactly like the ones the dead Umbrella soldiers had been wearing in the Raccoon City sewers. On the side of his breastplate was the simple word "HUNK."

"Hmmm… you weren't supposed to be part of this, I've been looking for this place for weeks and one of you just HAS to spoil it," he casually said to Claire, his tone full of confidence. A Desert Eagle like the one Leon had found was in his hand, and a pump shotgun was strapped to his back.

"I bet I wasn't supposed to be part of Raccoon either," she said, her gun still trained. "I'm probably going to kill you, you know, but out of curiosity, were you there? Did Birkin miss you somehow? Or do you have no idea what I'm talking about?"

"Oh, I was there, alright," he answered. "You might say I'm good at avoiding death. Claire Redfield, I presume? Yes, we know who all of you are, and Claire Redfield would be the only logical one that I'd run into here. Quite an escape from Rockfort and the Antarctic, I couldn't have done it better myself."

Not letting her hands shake in the slightest, Claire prepared to put an end to one more of Umbrella's obstacles. She had the gun trained right on his eye, the helmet might or might not have been bullet proof, but the goggles wouldn't be. And she had no intention of missing like she had the dog.

She stared through the sight of the gun, her voice unwavering in the face of this man, who'd work for those bastards called Umbrella.

"I'm flattered. Goodbye."

She squeezed the trigger and… click.

The click was getting worse then the rain. In her rush of thoughts, it never occurred to her that she might need to reload her gun. She tried it again. Click. Curse that damn sound, she never even noticed the slide was all the way back; no wonder the guy was so calm.

The man smiled underneath his mask, and raised his gun. Claire was quick to dive to the side, and the powerful round he fired took a chunk of rock from the wall instead of destroying her flesh and bone.

She rolled as his arm recovered from the pistol's recoil and he fired again. The room wasn't all that big in terms of being able to maneuver, and Claire was quickly wishing she'd just plain ducked behind the coffin. On top of which, the torches were starting to burn out, and Hunk's goggles would provide him with a large advantage when the lights grew dim enough to impair normal sight. Be that as it may, she sprung to her feet, fainted to one side, and then dived again the other way, throwing the man's aim off.

He had been a little careless. Claire ran straight for him before he could recover from the recoil, punched him in the face as hard as she could below the helmet, and dived past the door before he could react. She pulled it shut in case he tried to fire again.

Panting, Claire fumbled for her extra clip, jumping in shock when the man, not yet realizing that she'd closed the door, fired behind himself from the other side. The bullet put a huge dent into the metal, at least three inches in Claire's direction.

Hunk heard Claire reloading her gun through the door, and quickly decided that strategic retreat was the best course of action. He turned and leaped over the first coffin to where Claire had been hiding, just as she kicked the door back in and fired a shot. If she had been a second faster, the bullet would have caught him in the head.

Claire stood, waiting for him to make a move. Hunk tried to quickly peek over the stone coffin and take a shot, but Claire beat him to it and fired at him. He quickly ducked back down, and Claire hit nothing but stone. Hunk tried again, this time catching Claire while she started to consider a course of action. Again, she dodged to the side, and returned fire this time.

But the torches were almost totally out. There was enough light to see outlines of objects, and even that wouldn't last for a long time. But Hunk's advantage suddenly turned against him. Claire knew where he was hiding, and when he came out… she could see his goggles with their red glow.

She fired. Two shots… and 'click,' she ran out of bullets again. Why did this always have to happen at the worst possible time?

She could hear a laugh come from Hunk. He raised his Eagle once more. If Claire's guess about it's own ammo capacity was right, he was probably almost out himself. Almost. She couldn't get away this time, his advantage was too great, and he'd probably be able to easily outrun her anyway. That had been the reasoning behind her decision to stand and fight, anyway. Looking back, it didn't seem to be a very good decision.

She prepared to dive again, he had a good bead on her, but if she could anticipate his pulling the trigger she might have some slim chance of dodging again, if a miracle happened to be passing by.

In fact, one was. To Claire's astonishment, the top of the coffin behind Hunk, the decorative one, seemed to quietly slide off in the fading light. She blinked, making sure she wasn't seeing things. Her change of expression seemed to get Hunk's attention, who, keeping the gun on her, briefly turned around to see what was so fascinating. He was too close to the coffin to notice the top's absence without looking down, and he didn't.

He turned back. Almost immediately after, a form of some kind rose from the coffin, it looked vaguely human in shape, but Claire couldn't see it all that well. Her jaw dropped and Hunk, seeing this, went to look behind himself quickly again.

Whatever the thing was, it seemed to backhand the Umbrella soldier before he could fully look. Hunk went flying towards Claire and smashed against the wall next to her, his Helmut tumbling off his head in the process. Shocked, she just stared at Hunk running out the door and the dark figure following him. She opted to do the same as the light would be totally gone in a few seconds, and it fact, the torches in the passageway were already out. Claire had to feel her way out, step by step, stumbling every now and then until the light from outside was visible.

The rain had died down a little, but it was still coming down. Hunk, now revealed to be a man with blond hair somewhere in his thirties, stood several feet away from the entrance. The form, now revealed to be a man, had his back to Claire and was quite closer. She decided that for the moment, it'd be a better idea to watch.

"You weren't supposed to wake up yet," Hunk blandly stated.

"I have not the luxury of the eternal sleep I desire, Death. Perhaps I would if Father ever gave up."

Claire shook her head to clear herself from the aftermath of the adrenaline high she had just been on. This just kept getting weirder and weirder. As if getting attacked by a guy named 'Hunk' wasn't enough, there was a guy dressed in a cape with a Victorian accent, who had come from an old coffin, nonetheless.

"Oh come on, Alucard," Hunk answered. "I'm sure you know why I'm here. You don't even know the circumstances. I don't suppose, just this once, you'd come back?"

"Think you I would?"

"Not at all," laughed Hunk "Fortunately, your father just wants you alive. I'm quite free to forcefully subdue you, if need be."

With that, Hunk pulled the shotgun off of his back with one hand, and reached behind his back with the other. From there, he pulled a small weapon from seemingly nowhere. It was a small scythe, made for throwing. And he did just that, hurling the blade at Alucard with all his might. Alucard dashed to the side, and the scythe embedded itself in the ground near Claire.

Hunk now tried the shotgun. The primitive guns that a few monsters in Castlevania had were similar enough to this one for Alucard to know not to stop moving. In a blur, the dhampire cleared several feet and landed behind Hunk with his sword drawn. Hunk turned around just in time to be slashed by Alucard's family sword. Blue energy crackled from the blade, and blood poured from Hunk as it tore through his armor, but he wasn't dieing. That just wasn't going to happen. Alucard stabbed the sword through his gut and kicked him off, sending Hunk several feet towards Claire.

But the damage was only minor, and he stood easily.

"Return to my father, Death. Be assured, I will put an end to him again."

"I'm afraid I just can't do that, Alucard," was the response. Hunk pulled his scythe trick again, but was caught quite off guard by Claire before he could throw it. She had grabbed the one that had missed Alucard earlier and leapt onto Hunk's back, intent on slitting his throat. He managed to grab her arm with his free hand at the last second and start pushing her away, but she settled for turning the blade downward and giving in to his pushing.

Unable to stop himself, Hunk aided Claire in lopping his hand off at the wrist. Screaming in pain and anger, he flung her off of him with his arm, sans hand, and turned toward her. Claire was just looking up as Hunk raised his new scythe to cut her head in two, and Alucard was too far…

Click, "Drop it."

All three of them stopped dead and looked to the side. Claire, for the first time, appreciated the click as she saw her brother Chris, soaking wet, but pointing a gun at Hunk.

Hunk simply grinned, and turned to attack the newcomer. Chris fired before he even got close, putting a bullet into Hunk's head with ease. The man was dead before he fell.

Chris un-tensed himself and leaned over, joined by Claire, to search Hunk for anything revealing. The idea made them forget Alucard for the moment.

The dhampire shouted and started to run over; "Wait, do not…"

But he was too late. Hunk's arms suddenly came up and backhanded Chris and Claire, with Claire receiving a trail of blood on her face from his missing hand. They both fell backward, and hunk dissolved into a cloud of black mist.

The mist was only a method of teleportation for Death, unlike Alucard's form. Hunk reformed about ten feet away, his hand in place and no bullet hole in his head.

"What the hell," was Chris' reaction as he stood, gun raised. Claire was facing the other way when she stood, and noticed something else. There was a man leaning against a tree, watching the whole thing, and smiling. He was dressed all in black, it seemed, complete with dark sunglasses, but topped with blond hair. As Claire spotted him, he stood upright and grinned.

"Chris," she started, but like Alucard earlier, she was too late. The man broke into an inhumanly fast run, shoving her down and slamming Chris' head with his arm as he ran by. He kept running while Chris went down hard, and stopped when he reached Hunk.

"That's… really getting old, Wesker," Chris weakly said as he stood, checking his head for blood. It wouldn't be a surprise if he had a concussion.

"Yes Chris, yes it is," Wesker answered. "Maybe I'll just kill you this time."

Wesker leaned forward, about to break into another run as Chris stood. But Chris was starting to get used to the attack, and Wesker was letting himself get overconfident. When Wesker charged, Chris grabbed a long branch that had fallen from a tree in the storm, threw himself to the side, and replaced his body with the object.

Wesker ran right into it and, caught by surprise, promptly went flying. The wood itself snapped in two and was torn from Chris' hand, but it had served it's purpose.

Wesker picked himself up and casually dusted himself off. Considering the mud he had rolled through, it didn't help. His glasses were gone once more, and his yellow cat-like eyes glittered in the night.

"Funny, Redfield," Wesker commented as he snatched his glasses from the ground. One of the lenses was destroyed. "And do you have ANY idea how much these things cost?"

Chris raised his gun and fired, the bullet going through the other lens and into Wesker's chest right behind it. Wesker was either unaffected, or he was wearing a bulletproof vest. "My guess is that pair wouldn't cost all that much anymore…"

Wesker simply tossed the item aside and chuckled, as if he wouldn't mind being shot at all day.

"This is ridiculous, Alucard," Hunk pleaded, parrying and striking at the dhampire with a pair of his scythes.

"Indeed," was the reply. Alucard tore through his defense, once again getting through Hunk's armor easily and wounding him. "Your skills lack as a human, Death."

The wounded man vainly tried to strike, but Alucard's swordsmanship was more then enough to stop it from happening. The dhampire backhanded Hunk in the face, knocking him back.

Hunk hung back when Alucard started to do something else. He couldn't tell what was going on at first, but Alucard hunched over a bit and full on growled. His cloak pulled around his body and turned into a coat of dark fur, his arms and legs grew more joints, his face stretched into a canine's, and Alucard, in his wolf form, pounced on the surprised Hunk.

Wesker, on the other hand, was fairing much better against his physically inferior opponents. He was wearing Chris and Claire down, avoiding whatever they tried and getting in his own shots in the process.

Deciding to end it, Wesker grabbed Chris' arm as he tried to throw a right hook, pulled, and dislocated his shoulder. Chris bit his lip to stop from screaming, but Wesker had him. Still hanging on to Chris, Wesker kicked Claire in the stomach and grabbed her by the hair with his free hand before she could fall. He gripped onto the back of both their heads and, without another thought, slammed them together.

Alucard, gnawing on Hunk, saw the Redfields fall. He pushed himself up a little and bit into his fur like he had an itch, but came out with a Tarot card in his mouth. He tossed it up, and the card disappeared, but Hunk took advantage of the distraction and kicked the dhampire wolf off of him. Alucard was sent sprawling, but he quickly stood and shifted back to his normal form.

Meanwhile, Wesker picked up Chris' gun and checked the clip. As much as he wanted to break Chris' bones one by one, this had a better guarantee of distractions not allowing them to survive. Before he could use it, however, he heard a noise, some sort of squawk, and spun around. A large, red vampire bat was right in front of him, and it promptly spit a fireball into Wesker's face.

Wesker grabbed at his eyes with one hand and smacked the bat away with his other before he lost track of where it was. His eyes weren't quite as strong as the rest of his body. But the bat, like Wesker himself, was rather immune to injury. With remarkable speed, the bat righted it's flying and charged, barreling into Wesker literally like a bat out of hell. The ex-Captain fell to the side, and the bat continued on and did the same to Hunk.

Hunk wobbled to his feet, his form fading into the black-cloaked grim reaper as his strength faded. Grunting in frustration, Death motioned to Wesker and vanished.

Wesker was suddenly annoyed himself. The Redfields were out and couldn't do much anyway, but one on one, Alucard could easily match him and possibly win.

"He who fights and runs away," he commented, mock-waving to the dhampire, before he turned into the forest and dashed away.

Sheathing his sword, Alucard let his bat familiar land on his wrist. The bat formed back into the Tarot card, which in turn disappeared from Alucard's hand and back into the magical pocket in which he stored some excess items. He had wanted the sword card, but the pocket tended to act like a jumbled sack if something was pulled out hastily.

Alucard really noticed the rain for the first time, and was suddenly thankful that he'd kept the item that protected him from water. Be that as it may, the two humans who had been around were not so well off as he was.

---

Death hovered outside the door, his black cape fluttering in a surreal indoor breeze. Alucard hadn't quite bested him to the point where he would 'die,' but he wasn't able to assume human form again at the moment. Hunk would have to disappear for a few days.

Wesker had gone in to report because Death was having trouble keeping himself manifest after his beating, so now he was just waiting. He didn't have to wait very long; the sounds of heavy objects hitting walls in the next room told Death that Wesker was probably finished relating the recent events.

The door opened, and Wesker almost jumped out before slamming it behind him and leaning on it.

"I didn't know he got that angry," Wesker mused. "You've known him longer, does he always get like that?"

Shrugging, Death answered with, "There's a reason he was called Vlad the Impaler, you know."

Wesker opted to leave the door behind when something crashed into it's other side. He and Death started down the corridor.

"This will be a problem," surmised Death, his human voice replaced by an ethereal tone. "If our Sire has one weakness, it's that wretched Alucard…"

"Tell me about this son of his," Wesker asked, putting on a new pair of sunglasses. "I'd never heard of an Alucard until we went looking for him, not even in the myths."

"Alucard is a natural dhampire, his mother was a human named Lisa," explained Death as the two entered an elevator. His long scythe appeared in his hands, which he held up to produce a magical picture of Count Dracula and a beautiful woman in wedding clothes. "When she tried to help her kind with medicinal plants, the human villagers burned her at the stake for being a witch."

A shift of the scythe, and the picture changed to the grisly scene. "Alucard was obviously born before then, as Adrian Farenheights. He stood with us in the beginning, but that mother of his, her last wish was that he not despise humans, and so, he joined the Belmonts, defeated his father, then awoke centuries later and did it again. He thinks the world will be purged of the Dracula bloodline if he sleeps for all eternity, but his magic is flawed and he wakes up if there is a large shift of power or some other strange event that differs from the norm. In this case, because the spell isn't perfect, Lord Dracula managed to prevent our appearance from waking him up. Apparently my being right there was enough to set him off."

The elevator stopped on the castle's only small flat roof, where a helicopter sat on a pad. Wesker stepped out with Death close behind.

"Where are you going anyway?"

Wesker chuckled. "To make Umbrella's life miserable, so to speak. But after that little story, maybe I should phone Oprah."

"Who? Never mind, I don't want to know," answered Death.

"You'll have your hands full when I'm done, I'll tell you about it later."

"Very well, very well my friend," Death chuckled. "Don't let death take you too soon, heh heh."

With that, Death floated away and disappeared into thin air, and Wesker boarded his chopper.

---

"Alive," Alucard muttered to himself, having checked the two humans for their pulse. Neither was awake, and they obviously weren't in the healthiest of conditions, but Alucard had no idea how to fix that. All he had was a single, solitary Potion, and his magical methods of healing would only work on himself. The Mournblade sword restored physical health at the expense of what was being attacked, but that didn't help since neither of them was conscious to slash the sword at something.

A sound reached Alucard's ears, a low, soggy stepping. Someone was sneaking around nearby, and his dhampiric senses were just enough to hear it. Whoever or whatever it was seemed to be trying to keep quiet, but the wet ground made it impossible. Still leaning over the Redfields, Alucard reached into his magical pocket and pulled out another Tarot card, and this time it was the right one.

When the card disappeared, the dhampire moved his hand to his sword, but didn't stand. He waited, almost a minute passed…

And the semi-quiet watcher suddenly wasn't so quiet anymore. Alucard's familiar had done it's job, and a few seconds later, a man draped in a black overcoat leaped out from behind the tree and rolled when he hit the ground to avoid the floating sword that was chasing him. The sword half-heartedly followed through with it's phony slash that the man was going down to avoid, more so it could take position near Alucard.

"I've found him, master," the Familiar gleefully said as the man stood.

"So you have," Alucard responded, drawing his sword. At first glance, the newcomer looked like Wesker, right down to the sunglasses. But his hair was red, and he was younger, not to mention that Wesker hadn't actually been wearing a coat. "And as for you, sir, what are your intentions?"

"I'm looking for them," he motioned to Chris and Claire. "And for your sake, I hope you aren't the one responsible for their condition."

"I am not," Alucard sheathed his sword in a gesture of good will. "A man in black, like yourself, did this while I was… preoccupied. I have no means of treating them, nor do I even know who they are. And who might you be?"

"Name's Leon Kennedy. And you are?"

"…Alucard."

The sword familiar fidgeted, flying around it's owner before Alucard finally grabbed onto the handle. The sword turned back into the Tarot card, and Alucard tucked it away.

"That's a neat trick," commented Leon. "I know where they're staying, I was heading there myself. You'll understand if I ask you to come along?"

"Indeed," Alucard answered, feeling it in his best interest.

"Great, you can tell me what happened on the way."

---

**Later…**

"How are they?"

"Well," Leon started, leaning back against the counter and keeping Alucard in front of him. Neither of them fully trusted the other quite yet. "Claire's sleeping, she came out better then her brother, which is why I just put her in a bedroom. Chris' shoulder was dislocated, which I fixed, and I think he's got a mild concussion. Whatever was in that vile you gave me seemed to work, though."

Alucard nodded. Leon crossed his arms.

"So what's your story?"

"Pardon?"

Alucard simply didn't understand the question fully, having been asleep while language structure changed considerably. Leon misunderstood his response.

"Well let's see, you're dressed and you talk like you're from the Victorian age, you carry a sword and own a floating, talking one besides that, when you told me what happened in the forest you conveniently left out how you actually got there, and I get this feeling that you just aren't totally human, no offense."

"I could say the same of you. Tell me first, what's the year?"

Leon blinked behind his glasses. This was certainly getting odd. "1999."

Alucard's posture shifted suddenly, like he'd been hit in the head.

"It's the wrong year," muttered the dhampire. Death had asked him to side with his father again, which meant his father had most likely risen. But he had defeated him in 1792, so Dracula would have risen 7 years ago. Someone must have resurrected him early at some point and changed the one-hundredth year again.

"Hey, you listening?"

Leon's voice snapped Alucard from his thoughts. The dhampire started talking again before Leon could start asking questions himself.

"Is there a… castle of sorts near here? Perhaps bordering a village?"

Leon chuckled. "You'd be hard pressed to find a village around here in this day and age. Castles too, actually. In fact, the only castle I know of, specifically, is the headquarters for Castlevania Pharmaceuticals in the states."

Leon had unintentionally succeeded in getting Alucard's attention.

"Castlevania WHAT?"

"You're kidding me, right? I can't believe you've never heard of 'em," Leon replied, astonished. "CP is one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in existence, they're Umbrella Corporation's only competitor, in legal and illegal dealings, I might add."

Alucard arched an eyebrow, "How do you mean?"

"I thought you would've known, the man you told me about, Hunk, is an Umbrella agent."

Alucard shook his head, puzzled. The notion of Death working for some human organization made no sense. But then, this "Castlevania Pharmaceuticals" had to have something to do with Dracula, and if Umbrella was a competitor, then maybe Death was simply planning to get rid of his father's enemies in a discreet way. Still, the big picture didn't add up.

Leon waited for a reply. If he didn't get one, he was fully intent on starting to ask his own questions. Alucard started to think again, so Leon broke in.

"So, are you gonna' tell me who you are?"

"I told you already. I find it odd you wouldn't recognize the name," answered Alucard.

"It spells 'Dracula' backwards, I noticed."

"He's my father."

Leon stared for a second. And then he burst into laughter.

"What is so amusing?"

"You. Come on, already, I've faced zombies, things with exposed brains, giant spiders, and god knows what else, but I refuse to believe that you're Count Dracula's son."

A realization came over Alucard, one that explained a few things. He slowly opened his mouth to talk.

"You've forgotten, haven't you? The human race has forgotten him, is he nothing more then a fairy tale in this age? The Belmonts wouldn't have forgotten, I don't understand how…"

Leon suddenly stopped laughing and became serious. "Belmonts? What about the Belmonts?"

"So you remember them, at least? How is it that you not know of Castlevania? How long has this… industry been around?"

"Seven or eight years. And, coincidently, seven years ago was the last I heard of the Belmonts. Their son was a childhood friend of mine, but seven years ago the whole family… their house caught on fire one night, they all died."

Alucard's face was expressionless. He pulled a chair out from the table and sat on it, appearing totally calm. Then he slammed his fist on the cheap table, splintering the wood.

"DAMN you, father," he yelled, anger saturating his voice. "It was his doing, it was HIM, a Belmont would never be bested by something so utterly trivial!"

"Heh, well, they had the absolute longest family line I've ever seen, the name stuck for hundreds of years, they told me once, with some small break in the 1800's before one of them had it legally changed back to Belmont."

Leon kept quiet after that, defining Alucard as a little eccentric, if not totally crazy. He figured it best to let him ramble as much as he wanted.

"You're lucky that thing was cheap. At least I think it was."

Leon turned to the doorway, where Chris was now away and standing, holding his head with one hand.

"Leon?"

Leon extended his hand in response. "I am."

"Chris Redfield, nice to meet you in person," replied Chris, shaking his hand. He looked at Alucard as he sat down, and turned to Leon when he realized the stranger was staring off into space. "Who's that?"

"I've been trying to figure it out myself."

Chris, still a little fuzzy, blinked at Leon. "And why the hell are you dressed like Albert Wesker?"

"Coincidence?" Leon answered.

"You look like his evil twin."

"And you look like hell, Chris," interjected Claire, who was now standing in the doorway where Chris had been. A red-stained sterile pad was taped over a cut on her forehead that she'd received from Wesker. Chris opted to put his head in his arms on the table while Claire went on. "Do you people have any idea how loud you are?"

"Hello, Claire," Leon greeted her with trepidation.

"Leon," she nodded. "How's Sherry?"

"She's fine."

"That doesn't tell me much!"

"There ISN'T much," answered an agitated Leon. "She's in government custody, and she's okay. That's it."

"Government," Chris repeated, raising his head from the table. "As in US government? What do they have to do with this?"

"They currently employ me," Leon said, sitting down. "It's a long story."

"We have plenty of time." Claire responded, sitting down. Even Alucard seemed to break out of his thoughts, if for no other reason then to stay informed as Leon launched into his story.

_---_

_"Leave Sherry out of this!"_

_"She knows too much. It's you or her. Make it you, and I'll see to it she's kept far away from any of this."_

_Leon put his face in his hands, having no idea what to do. He didn't have much of a choice, really. Whether or not this guy was telling the truth, Sherry was definitely screwed if he said no, but might not be if he said yes._

_The man pressed on, "Well, Mr. Kennedy? Yes, or no?"_

_What else could he do?_

_"Thank you," smiled the man, after Leon nodded sharply. The ex-rookie cop simply couldn't find his voice._

_The man stood, saying, "The guard outside will show you to a room, I suggest you get some sleep. You'll need it for tomorrow."_

_But Leon didn't sleep that night. Even if it wasn't for the stress of his situation at the moment, nightmares of Raccoon City had been plaguing him off and on and sleep was something he'd given up on at the moment._

_The remaining hours of the night passed away as Leon simply sat on the cot in his 'room' and thought. Thought about Raccoon City, Claire, Ada, Sherry, he prayed that Sherry would be all right. Telling Claire off suddenly seemed like it had been a very bad idea._

_Eventually, the door opened, and the same suited man entered._

_"Ready?"_

_Leon didn't answer; he just stood, and followed him. Down the corridor, past several doors, the place looked like a normal building with normal people going about their business, the one exception being the uniformed guards and officers present in the mix. Leon actually looked out of place with his rumpled clothes and exhausted posture._

_The man finally stopped in front of a door, opened it, and motioned Leon in. Leon obeyed, noting that his guide opted not to enter and instead simply shut the door, leaving the ex-cop to contemplate his surroundings._

_The normality of the building came to a dead halt as Leon realized he was standing in an operating room. A surgical table was set into the middle of the floor, and at present it had an angle to it. Various pieces of medical equipment was lining the counters, although it was the set of bloody scalpels and other like cutting tools on a cart next to the table that gave Leon the chills._

_It suddenly hit him that the man had offered no explanation as to what they were going to have him do, or for that matter, what they were going to do to him, but he didn't have time to contemplate the thought further as the door opened and a woman wearing glasses and a lab coat over a t-shirt and jeans walked through._

_"Vell vell, you must be zee new patient," she said as she walked by him, her voice drowned in a German accent. As if this weren't bad enough, Leon suddenly feared he was going to get sliced up by a Nazi war criminal._

_"So vat's your name," she asked, making a face at something._

_"Leon," he answered._

_She turned to him and nodded, "Dr. Luccianna, at your service."_

_She turned back to whatever she had been frowning at before._

_"Vhy can't anyone pick up after demselves! Wretched leftover mess! It's not MY fault dere are so few bio-chemists that ve have to use dere crap operating rooms!"_

_With that, she grabbed the cart with the bloody tools on it and flung it to the far end of the room. Luckily it had wheels, so all it did was roll and bang into the wall._

_Dr. Luccianna calmed down and sighed. "I ask for a simple set of syringes prepped and a monitor ready, and I get bloody butcher knives instead. Harrumph. Oh vell, I'll just be a minute setting up I guess, you can take off your shirt and lie down zere."_

_He did as he was told. He didn't have the worry of getting cut up any more, but he certainly wasn't going to piss this woman off after that little display._

_A few minutes later, Dr. Luccianna was satisfied enough to proceed. Leon had sensors stuck to his chest and temples, and an IV going through the back of his hand. "Let's see… heartbeat's fine, temperature iz normal, hmmm, vhat's dat scar from?"_

_"Got shot a month ago," Leon answered. "There's a scar from the exit wound, too."_

_"Hmm, I see. I'd look at zem again vhen I'm done wit you. Okay zen, I might as vell tell you, dis is going to hurt."_

_"I've been through worse," he replied, chuckling. "I'll live."_

_"You vill, sort of," she commented, fastening Leon's head, waist, ankles and wrists to the table with straps he hadn't noticed before. "You're also going to convulse a lot, but you should black out before it gets really bad. After dat, you'll enter a normal sleep for a bit and ve'll take you to your room to vait the whole ting out, it'll take a few hours, and it's going to be a bit unpleasant."_

_He wasn't quite sure how to respond to all of that, and opted not to as she gave him a mouthpiece to bite on. Leon watched as she retrieved a vial from a pocket in her coat, and his eyes went wide in terror as he realized it was the exact same vial the G-virus sample had been in._

_But he calmed down when he noticed that the liquid inside wasn't purple, it was actually a dark blue. She pulled a thin syringe from a rack on the counter and filled it with the stuff from the vile. He was expecting the needle to go into his arm, but she put it through the needle-hole in the IV._

_"Here ve go," she said, pressing the pump down._

_Leon quickly discovered that she hadn't been kidding. He could actually feel the stuff entering his blood stream, and it HURT. It spread from his hand in seconds, and it felt like a metal was forming itself to fill his veins as it went through his arm and into his chest. He wanted desperately to grab at it, and he tried, but the straps held firm, holding him down as every nerve in his body felt like it'd been cut, one by one._

_He instinctively tried to scream, tried to break lose and do something to make it stop, he'd strangle the doctor if it would encourage her to make it stop. But at most he could only grunt through the mouthpiece and pull at the straps. In the space of only a few seconds, the vial's liquid had reduced Leon Kennedy to a silent, twitching form, the agony demonstrating irrevocably the worth of his existence._

_---_

_The room was dimmer then before when Leon awoke, though by no means dark. He tried to remember what was going on, his memory was a blur at first. It all came back. The man, his offer, Dr. Luccianna's injection, and the pain, he certainly remembered the pain._

_Leon bolted up at that thought, realizing something was wrong. Mercifully, the pain was gone, but he still didn't feel right, like that wretched liquid was crawling under his skin. He paced, trying to rub at it through his skin like he was trying to keep warm, but he was trying to make it stop. It was maddening._

_He also realized he was back in his room, and looked at himself in the mirror. His skin seemed a little paler, but other then that, he looked perfectly normal. A little too perfect. The scar near his shoulder that he'd gotten from being shot by Annette Birkin was gone, like it had never been there in the first place. The door swung open before he could contemplate it any more. Dr. Luccianna had let herself in._

_"What... what did you do to me," he stuttered, not moving his gaze from the mirror._

_"It vill be a little difficult to explain, I just came to check on you. Trust me, you von't vant to try to make any sense of dis until you can think clearly."_

---

"Well, the rest is kind of boring," Leon finished. "You might just say I came away from the experience a little changed, and… enhanced."

"Leon, take off your glasses," asked Chris, before anyone else could say anything. Everyone else, in fact, regarded him with a look of confusion.

"No," the ex-cop flatly refused.

Chris pulled his hand gun from it's holster and casually chambered a round, like he would need one more shot for something. Replacing his gun, he said, "Yes."

"No, I don't think so," was Leon's answer as he stood.

"Fine," Chris sighed, leaning back in his chair. No one expected it when he snatched his gun again and, in a flash, pointed it at Leon and pulled the trigger. No one expected Leon to run faster then any normal human, dodging the sudden threat as fast as Wesker could.

"Never know when a blank round'll come in handy," Chris commented. Indeed, the wall showed no signs of damage, and neither did Leon, for that matter. Leon made a face, mentally kicking himself for giving it away as everyone looked at him expectantly.

"Alright Leon," Claire jumped in. "Explain."

"Fine," he said, reaching up to pull off his glasses.

Claire was visibly shocked, Chris had the look of someone whose suspicions were confirmed, and Alucard, oddly, became confused.

Leon now saw with fire-colored feline eyes. Just like Wesker.

---


	2. French Riviera

**Resident Evil: Demon Rising,** **part 2**

_French Riviera_

---

Broken glass crunching under his boot, Albert Wesker surveyed his handiwork. The lab was a total wreck, the scientists and technicians who had been in the room were all lying dead, and a sample of the T-Virus was in his hand.

Wesker laughed.

"Easy come," he said to himself, hurling the vial into a corner. The virus splattered all over it's surface and the equipment that stood there and dripped down, some of it running into a ventilation duct near the floor.

"Easy go," Wesker laughed. "That takes care of the rest of the place."

He walked into a nearby office and triggered a secret door in the wall. The supervisor of the facility seemed to be fond of spy movies, it seemed, and the last thing Wesker needed to find wasn't exempt from this.

From the schematics he'd seen, this wasn't the only little hideaway, but it was the only one he needed. At the far end sat a computer terminal that glowed an eerie blue. He took off his glasses to better see in the dim light the screen provided, and took an old notebook from his pocket.

He flipped through a few pages, finally finding the one he wanted. Umbrella thought he was dead, and when he was still working for them, the access codes given to employees that died were never changed, just given to someone else. He'd even found a letter from the bigwigs to the facility's commander that mentioned it, confirming his suspicion that Umbrella was too lazy to change policy.

Thankful that these were universal to every base, he typed in the line of letters and numbers, and the clever symbols that needed to use the alt function on the keyboard to go through. It made it pretty hard for a code to be deciphered. A few seconds after entering the code key, a confirmation came up on the screen that reported the facility's entrances and exits were silently locked down.

But Wesker didn't stop at that; he entered in another code, this one even longer since he was setting it to affect only a certain area of the facility.

Smiling, he pressed the enter key and walked out. No sooner had he entered the main lab again then a cool, female voice came through the speakers.

"The self-destruct sequence has been activated, repeat, the self destruct sequence has been activated, this sequence can not be aborted, all personal evacuate laboratories immediately."

Wesker ran, leaving the main lab far behind. He raced through the facility and cleared the labs in seconds, stopping outside the cliché-hidden entrance. He looked in the direction of the labs and brought his arm up, fixing his gaze on his watch. At a total of five minutes from when he'd turned on the self-destruct, the ground rumbled as if there was an earthquake. An explosion rocked the general area of the labs, and the sound was music to Wesker's ears. And best of all, the rest of the place was still intact, just like he wanted.

"Death, he called. "Death, I need you!"

The reaper materialized scythe first in front of Wesker.

"Ahhhh… a nice piece of destruction you've made here. I wish you were around centuries ago! What do you need?"

"I need you to get to a computer and send a message," he answered, reaching into a pouch on his vest and pulling out a piece of paper. "Then do some other assorted things. It's all here."

Taking the paper in a bony hand, Death half-bowed in acknowledgment and disappeared.

---

"Dr. Luccianna, besides being a bio-chemist, is a trained spy. She made this… well, this," Leon indicated himself, "at Castlevania Pharmaceuticals, Umbrella's biggest competitor in biological weapons. And her first subject happened to be the corpse of one Albert Wesker."

"So that's what he meant."

"Huh," Claire said turning to her brother. "What do you mean?"

"On Rockfort Island, Wesker told me he had to sell his soul to a new organization… I thought he meant some kind of terrorist group or something Of course it was kind of hard to rationalize things, I couldn't breath at the time… but if this doctor was just spying, why'd she need to make this stuff THERE, and use it on Wesker in the first place?"

"She needed research that CP holds very, very tightly. The regenerative property of this stuff, the part that brought Wesker back to life and keeps either of us from getting injured by trivial things, is taken right from William Birkin's G-Virus. And apparently they got it quite simply. You know your friend Hunk, Claire? He works for CP behind Umbrella's back."

"I do not understand," Alucard said, flipping through the pages of an old book he'd noticed on a shelf in the house.

"What's so hard to understand, he's a double agent," Leon repeated in response to Alucard's comment.

"But that is what I find strange… Death isn't one to trouble with such things… for that matter, my father usually tries to spread his evil out from the moment he awakens. Does this look familiar?"

He slid the book across the table in Leon's direction. The ex-cop picked it up and looked at the open page. The yellowed paper was home to a drawing of an old, gothic-like castle.

"Of course, it's CP's headquarters," Leon answered, turning to the cover to see what the book was. The aged gold embroidery read "Myth's throughout the Centuries; 1985 edition."

Confused, Leon flipped back to the middle and read the caption, 'Ancient artist's rendition of the supposed castle of Vlad the Impaler. Believed a hoax as the castle has never been found.'

"Coincidence, I still don't believe it," Leon answered, setting the book down.

Claire rubbed her eyes, still not really recovered from having her skull banged against her brother's. "Well, he DID sort of come out of a coffin."

Chris blinked, "Coffin?"

Alucard grew agitated, "Why do you sharply refuse to even consider believing my word? You're a dhampire yourself!"

Leon looked visibly disturbed, and Chris was still confused.

"A what?"

"Half-breed spawn of a vampire and a human," Claire answered, still rubbing her eyes. She looked up to see her brother staring at her oddly. "So sue me, I was studying for a minor in mythology before I went to look for your sorry butt."

"I can smell my own kind without difficulty," Alucard said to Leon. "Do you have a bloodlust?"

Leon sighed, replacing his glasses as he answered. "Yeah."

Claire looked away from him, apparently now interested in Alucard. But Leon suddenly realized he had been staring at the blood on her bandage. Talking about it sparked an interest.

"I can control it," he added.

"Leon," Chris broke in, but Leon cut him off.

"She told me all of this..."

---

"Vell, dis is all turning out exactly as I'd expected…"

"And?"

Dr. Luccianna pulled her eyes from the microscope and turned to Leon.

"And dat's a good thing, at the very least. How does it feel?"

Pulling his shirt back on, Leon actually thought about the question. Even then, he couldn't come up with a very specific answer.

"Still feels... weird."

"Dat vill pass," the doctor replied. She took another quick glance into the microscope and added something to the sample of Leon's blood that she'd just taken.

"Dat von't take long," she sat down, suddenly sounding exasperated. "Vhat did they tell you, Leon? How'd you get into dis?"

"Guy in a suit told me to choose between myself and a twelve year old girl," he answered.

"Dat's so typical," she sighed. "Vork vit de government, do good... dis job is de ultimate example of good intentions being carried out by sinister means, you know. I ask vat to do ven de company I was spying in recently points to a corpse and says 'experiment on dis!' So I'm told to just do it to avoid suspicion, and I make someone just like you, someone on the opposite side, I vonder how many vill die because of dat?"

"What do you mean?"

Standing up, Dr. Luccianna went on as she checked the sample again.

"Vell, it vorked... you vant to know vat you are? I'll start at de beginning," she explained. Leon nodded with a surprising amount of patience.

"Ven dey gave me dis assignment, the only thing I first had to vork vith vas a very old sample of DNA, from blood taken hundreds of years ago. I don't know how dey got it, it looked human, but ven I really looked close, dere vere abnormalities… anyvay, dey just told me to use Umbrella's research as a base to artificially duplicate the abnormalities in dat DNA. So I vorked at their rival company for a vhile and completed it. And here ve are."

"So what does it do?"

Leon's voice was edgy; it was obvious he was really asking what it'd done to him personally.

"Dis is all going to sound like some veird horror joke. The sample I vas given, dey told me, belonged to a Nosferatu, a vampire. My task vas to artificially turn a human into a partial vampire, the term is dhampirism. And it vorked"

She handed him a mirror. He had no idea what to think, vampires... but whatever he wanted to believe, a look in the mirror, at his eyes, suddenly forced him to accept he wasn't human anymore. A few minutes ago they had been normal, but no more.

He dropped the mirror.

"Why..."

"Perfect soldier," she answered. "To tell you de truth, I have no idea if any of dat vampire stuff is true, but you're stronger, faster and much more resilient then any normal human vill ever be, even if you don't feel any different in dose respects just yet."

---

"I'll be in the car," Claire commented when Leon finished. Chris had briefly gotten up to hook a laptop up to the phone line and was in the process of connecting it to the Internet.

"Bout time, Jill," he said to himself, checking what he hoped was a secure e-mail account. "Finally some good news… what the?"

A message from Jill Valentine wasn't the only thing Chris had received. He turned the laptop to face the center of the table so everyone else could see what he'd just noticed himself.

To: Whom it may concern  
From: You should know me rather well  
Re: Let's talk about that, shall we?

Most of you know me as Hunk. Alucard, I can almost SEE the confusion on your face as I type this, this may be coming over on a work of man unfamiliar to you but I'm betting you still know how to read, so if you're still with your newfound human friends, I advise you to pay close attention. You never know when Father might be involved.

You have all meddled in Umbrella's affairs a great deal. Be that as it may, I myself have a use for you. You see, the Paris research facility, the same that one Claire Redfield should recognize, recently had an… accident. I'm supposed to clean it up but I have other pressing matters I must attend to. Since Umbrella is not an official employer as far as I'm concerned, I have would have no problem with it if they were to go down the drain.

If, however, the facility is not cleaned up, their annoying mercenaries will endlessly hound me. I propose a deal to you all. If you destroy the facility, which shouldn't prove to be an overly huge challenge, then not only will you stop the T-Virus from spreading to Paris, but I'll give you all the evidence you need to legally burn the company down in flames. The location and the computer access codes you will need are enclosed; an entry key is hidden at the front door. The authorities are present at the scene but someone who owes me a favor is keeping them back from entering the complex.

And Alucard; the master awaits your arrival. Don't disappoint.

Death

---

"I had just been informed you were heading out," Count Dracula talked, once again looking out the window if his recently renovated office.

"I'm on my way out, Sire," Wesker answered. "But I wanted to tell you something first."

"Yes?"

"I finished it."

A seldom-seen side of Vlad the Impaler came to the surface. The age-old vampire whirled around, a true smile painting his face for the first time in hundreds of years.

"So soon?!"

"And so perfect," Wesker answered. He was certainly proud of his feat. "It works perfectly in every simulation, in EVERY one."

"Go with Death," was the count's response as he grinned and sat in his chair. "Bring one of them back here and test it. Make sure the others get what Death promised, Umbrella has served their purpose and they must now be removed."

Wesker bowed, turned, and left, leaving Count Dracula to his thoughts.

"But you don't fail me Death," he said to himself. "Don't even think of failing me in this."

---

Closing the laptop, Chris passed clips for the handgun type they both used over to Claire. She tucked them away into her pockets, busy loading a round into the grenade launcher she'd opted to acquire earlier. One just like it had carried her through Raccoon City and Rockfort, and she wasn't going to be caught under-armed against the likes of Umbrella and their experiments.

Chris's handgun was still by his side, and he was chambering a round into his shotgun. Leon had pulled a futuristic looking rifle type weapon from under his coat, and he was setting the power pack in.

"That looks like something out of Star Trek, Leon," Chris noted.

"I think it's supposed to," Leon answered, giving his weapon a once-over like it was the first time he'd seen it. "The head of R&D where I get this stuff is a little loopy. It's a mass driver, actually."

Strapping the grenade launcher on her back, Claire took one of the clips Chris had given her and re-loaded her gun. She turned to Alucard, "Are you coming?"

"Yes," the dhampire replied. He had otherwise been just standing there in thought, not having to go through the preparations the others did. "It's a trap."

"Yes, I know," Chris acknowledged. "But being the noble good guys, we have to make sure there's no chance of that virus getting around."

"That e-mail certainly sent bells and alarms ringing," Leon added.

Chris turned to his sister; "Claire, do you think you could still get into the place from where you did last time?"

"Probably, why?"

"I want to keep some extra options open, we might want, or need, to split up. Or there might be a nasty surprise waiting at the main entrance, you never know. Okay, I just need to leave a message for Jill in case she gets here before we get back, and we're gone. I figure it'll be a three-hour drive, at least."

Leon and Claire went outside while Chris fumbled around the kitchen for a post-it note while Leon and Claire went outside, and Alucard opted to follow them.

"The jeep is ours to use," Claire pointed out in the garage, hopping in the driver's seat before her brother came out. Leon got in the back with Alucard, who opted to simply follow and not ask what the thing was. Chris came through the door at that moment, and stopped dead in his tracks when he saw Claire.

"Hop in, bro," she smiled, a rather glaring smile. Chris did so, and immediately fastened his seatbelt.

Tightly.

---

Leaning over the roof of the building that served as a feint for Umbrella's lab, Wesker put a pair of binoculars to his eyes and looked down when he spotted movement. Sure enough, he had a perfect view of the jeep carrying the four invited guests. They were still a fair distance away, only now about to turn off the main road and onto a block that they could access the building from.

The early morning darkness might have been the perfect cover for them, if Wesker hadn't had enhanced senses, anyway. With the soon-to-be intruders spotted, Wesker retreated further back onto the roof where Death floated in wait.

"They're here. And he's with them," he told the Reaper.

If he didn't know any better, Wesker could have sword that Death's skeletal face had been formed into a smile.

"Which one do you want?"

"I don't care," Wesker replied. "If we're lucky, they'll get separated by themselves, and I'll just go for the closest. Maybe that one I don't recognize, but it would be fun to get Redfield or his sister."

"Ahhhh, so Wesker has a devilish side in him," Death mused. "If they split up, we should go in opposite directions, it will give us more time to single our targets out and get away before the others even realize something's wrong."

"Agreed."

Death vanished in his usual fashion, and Wesker dashed off.

Claire brought the jeep to a halt on a busy, public street a nice distance away from where she knew Umbrella was hiding, prompting everyone to get out. Chris looked at the map Hunk had given the, it was pretty straightforward, and he motioned everyone into an ally.

"Okay, this is straight-forward, we've all got a copy of the codes he gave us for this place," he explained. "There are police and military all around where the labs would be, but there shouldn't be any inside. The entrance that we want is that way," he pointed.

The small group made there way in the direction, sticking to alleyways and other obscure places so their arsenal would go unnoticed. Alucard even kept his cloak tightly wrapped around him so the lining's glow wouldn't give off light, but he couldn't keep himself from gazing in wonder at things of what was virtually a new world from when he last went to sleep.

"And this is a 'main' entrance," Leon asked to no one in particular, as they ended up in front of a fence that sealed off an innocent-looking office building, with a line of three garbage dumpsters on the fence's inner perimeter. They were facing it's east side, and there were no guards around at the moment. There were slightly visible lines in the wall near the ground, probably not noticeable to anybody just passing by and not looking for anything strange. Down near the end of the building, a few floors up, was a massive gash that tore through a row of windows.

"Hey, they still haven't fixed it," Claire commented in jest.

A helicopter sounded near by; probably the local authorities on patrol but wondering why they couldn't go in. being spotted would not be a good thing.

"After Rockfort, I swore I'd never climb anything again," Chris stated, noting that the fence wasn't barbed. Nevertheless, he quickly scaled the mesh and dropped over the other side, followed closely by Claire. The nearby dumpster seemed to get Chris' attention, however, as he fixed his eyes on a certain spot and walked toward it.

The helicopter was closer now, and the ambience from a searchlight was reaching over the building's roof, prompting Chris and Claire to press onto the wall. Chris had something in his hand; it looked like a strip of duct tape.

"Great," Leon said, looking up. "I think I'll opt to jump over, myself…"

With that, he backed up, broke into a run, somersaulted clear over the fence and landed silently, joining the other two.

Alucard, however, didn't get the chance to get over before the helicopter's sweep brought it overhead. It's searchlight didn't bother going anywhere near the side of the building, but it was heading for the other side of the fence at a rapid pace.

And it just swept by where Alucard was standing, seeing nothing except an odd cloud of mist. As the light passed by, the mist itself seemed to gravitate past the fence, slipping through the mesh like the air it was. The light passed by over the light fog again as the helicopter swung around, and then went dark as the light passed. When the ambient light hit again, Alucard was standing on the other side.

"I thought the sword was a neat trick," Leon mused.

Chris took a closer look at the duct tape in his hand. Attached to it, previously strapped to the dumpster, was a plastic card bearing Umbrella's logo and a barcode.

"There's that. Wonder where the keyhole is…"

---

Death watched the computer screen closely, waiting for Chris to find the way in. His skinless fingers tapped impatiently on the table, and a zombie shuffled somewhere behind him. No matter, the undead didn't think to attack him; maybe they could sense the lack of meat on his frame.

Death's wish was granted as Chris noticed the card hole near the secret door, and they'd seen that too. He used the card, surprised that it got totally sucked in by the reader, but they were content as the large slab of concrete and steel moved up.

"That's right, humans… a little more…"

Wesker needed one of the humans alive, that wasn't a problem. Two of the humans entered first… Death tapped a button, and watched as the door closed and locked, trapping them inside, and leaving one of them outside with Alucard. Two out of three wasn't bad.

---

"Damn it! Of all the…"

"Figures," Leon commented, grabbing the access card, which had come out on their side. He ran it through the reader on this side, which was plainly visible. Nothing happened. "If that thing's as thick as I think it is, we're not going back out that way."

Claire turned toward the opposite end of the chamber, where a normal sized but locked door was set into the wall. "Okay then, if we can't get out, we go in," she pulled the grenade launcher off her back and pointed toward the door. "I'll give this a try."

The door looked to be made of solid steel, but it certainly wasn't as large as the entryway. Claire backed up a little and pulled the trigger, sending a grenade into the obstruction. It exploded with force, not knocking down the door but noticeably damaging it.

"It's a start," she commented, grabbing another grenade from her sash and reloading her weapon. She aimed again, but Leon put his hand on the weapon.

"Wait, save the ammo, I'll take care of it."

Claire was content to comply, having learned the value of conservation in Raccoon City, Rockfort Island and the Antarctic. Leon stepped up to the door and ran a hand along it's surface, finally taping it a couple of times with his fist. After that, he took a step back and threw the hardest punch he could.

Not only did his fist dent the door in more, it started to shake it loose from the hinges. Leon hit it again, and again, and again, kicking it or throwing himself into the middle every now and then. Slowly, but surely, the door started to give way under his inhuman strength.

---

"We're not getting in from here," Chris admitted, tapping his gun against the wall. He tried not to worry about Claire, she could take care of herself, and she and Leon knew each other from Raccoon, at least. But the problem was getting in themselves.

"Perhaps that," Alucard said, looking off to the extensive damage in the building's side caused by Umbrella's pursuit of Claire not too long ago. There weren't any windows lower then the damage, but the side of the building was too smooth to climb.

"No, I left my grappling hook in my other vest," Chris jested. "I don't suppose you have rope or anything hidden away?"

"No, however I can improvise, remain here."

Before Chris could ask where exactly he was going, Alucard provided an answer. The dhampire crouched down and pushed his cloak into the air. The glowing cloth wrapped around his arms and formed into wings, while the rest of him completed the transformation into the bat.

Alucard flapped his wings hard, getting of the ground and quickly ascending parallel to the building and moved into the gap. Chris waited, anxious for something to happen, and he got his wish.

Just not in the way he wanted.

A growl sounded behind him, and Chris spun around just in time to see a zombie dog pounce at him with no warning. Instinctively he dived out of the way, just fast enough to avoid the monster's jaws. No warning… the ground was a lawn, a dry lawn; the dog's walking hadn't made any noise.

Determined to prevent any of his limbs from becoming a midnight snack, Chris pulled his shotgun without even getting up and blasted the thing as it jumped at him again. The point-blank range discharge blew the lethal yet frail creature into pieces.

Another growl, almost identical to the one he'd just heard, perfect, there was more of the things around. Chris made a dash for the area below the damage, not really knowing what Alucard could do to bail him out but hoping he could do something anyway.

He looked behind himself and caught sight of the two new dogs chasing him. Once again, he dived away, and the not-so-bright animals overshot him. Quickly standing, he totally destroyed one of them with his shotgun like he'd done to the first, but the second was too close and too fast for him to re-pump the grip aim, and fire.

Instead, Chris pulled his handgun and fired. The shot caught it squarely in the head, killing it. Sounds of more dogs were close by, but Chris wouldn't have to worry. A long fire hose dropped down from the building and hung a few feet up from the ground. Chris could see Alucard in the building, holding onto it.

Getting a running start, Chris jumped for the hose and managed to grab on just above the nozzle. He pulled himself up hand over hand until he could get his feet on the wall, giving him some leverage. What worried him were the bullet holes that riddled the hose. It wouldn't be very healthy if it were torn enough to break.

Be that as it may, he managed to scale the wall completely. But the hose just didn't want to hold his weight, and it snapped just as he reached the top. Chris grabbed onto the ruined concrete as he felt himself fall, and let out a sigh of relief that he'd been close enough to do so. Alucard offered a hand and pulled him up.

"Thanks," Chris panted.

---

Leon was starting to get angry. At least he could hit the object of his anger. The door had been very annoying, and it was finally starting to give, just a little more… he backed up halfway across the room and ran at it, slamming his shoulder and every ounce of strength he had into the crumbling metal thing.

It worked, and the door flew off and Leon had to catch himself from tripping as he came to a halt in the next room.

"Harrumph. Way to make someone feel useless, Leon."

"Hey, I got us in, didn't I? Come on, let's go."

Past the entry chamber was a set of double sliding doors that had been dislocated from their racks. They, in turn, led to the 'bottom' of a T-shaped corridor. The walls were dotted with a door here and there, and Claire, curious, went up to one. She drew her handgun as a precaution, and pulled the door open.

A zombie was standing right in front of the door on the other side. It saw her and reached out, it's rotted flesh barely clinging to it's body. Claire raised the gun in front of it's head and pulled the trigger, sending it down for good.

"All the challenge is gone," Leon commented, trying the door across from Claire. It was locked, so he kicked it in, and was promptly leaped upon by a Licker that had been on the ceiling in the room. He grabbed it's arm as it tried to tear his face to shreds with it's claws, and viciously whipped it down the hallway.

"I got it," Leon told Claire as the Licker scrambled to it's feet and came towards them. Leon reached under his coat and pulled out his rifle. "C'mon, little bastard."

He let it get a little closer. Then he aimed and pulled the trigger. The rifle made an energetic noise and recoiled in his arms, sending a large bolt of blue at the Licker that promptly blew it's head and upper body apart.

"Star Trek, Leon?"

He smiled, pumping the grip like a shotgun. The casing for the large shell dropped out and onto the floor. "Why don't we look at the whole hallway first before doing that again?"

"Agreed."

They walked down the long corridor towards the split at the end, mindful of their surroundings and any possible surprises that might be made known.

"So where _is_ Sherry, Leon?"

He grunted. "I told you, she's safe," he answered, still walking.

"Don't pull that shit on me!"

"Claire, do you _like _being told off? I could do an even better job right now, if you prefer, there aren't any little kids around."

"Oh I get it, I'm the villain," Claire laughed. "Poor innocent Leon got his feelings hurt by the nasty bitch?"

"I'm lucky if I can remember ever HAVING feelings," he snapped. "Poor innocent Leon died on Dr. Luccianna's table."

"Yeah, the vampire freak has it so hard."

Leon grabbed her and forced her to look at him.

"Let me tell you something," he shot at her as he pulled off his glasses so she could see his eyes. "This much pain tends to… you know, I can't even put into words what I felt like afterward, but I died a little inside Claire, and I don't just mean being half-undead."

Claire didn't show any emotion on her features. She did, however, draw her hand back and slap Leon clear across the face.

"Don't you DARE touch me again!"

"That didn't hurt, you know."

She slapped him once more, "Sure is fun!"

Before either could say anything more, a light sound hit their ears, an elevator tone. The elevator was in the wall across from them, in the middle of where the hallway turned into a T. It dinged again, and the doors opened, allowing another rotting zombie to shamble out. Leon scowled, raised his rifle, and blew it in half.

---

Looking away from the computer that sat in front of him, Alucard re-checked the letters and symbols on the piece of paper in his hand. Leon had given him a crash course on computers during the ride over, commenting that if he was going to keep going on about having slept for 400 years then he might as well play along to kill time.

The system he'd found in the facility's built-in library had been left on, and it's default was for entering the facility's access codes for various functions, so even having literally been under a rock for the last few centuries didn't keep him from at least entering the code line.

Alucard had seen a lot in his life. So he wasn't surprised when a glossy, circular object fell in front of his face and in his lap, seemingly from nowhere. He stood and turned around, the object in his hand.

"What do you here, Death?"

"Why, I've only come to fulfill my part of the bargain, Alucard," the reaper replied. "That disc contains everything needed for the explicit purpose of destroying Umbrella in the human courts. But, you may want to leave it here for your friends, I'm afraid you'll be coming with me."

"I implore you Death," Alucard answered, drawing his sword. "Stop having delusions."

"Harrumph. You have no vision, Alucard. Very well, if you must make my life difficult," Death answered, gesturing with his arms. Small scythes appeared everywhere out of thin air, and every one of them started to spin and charge at Alucard, matching his direction. The dhampire darted around Death and baited most of the scythes to embed themselves into the scattered books on the shelves.

Hopping up, Alucard pushed himself off of the wall and catapulted at Death, slashing at the reaper on the way by. Death, annoyed, reached under his robe and pulled out his shotgun and fired. Alucard wasn't expecting it and ended up getting lambasted by the massive weapon's shot, the force ten times as much as the muskets he'd been pegged with in Castlevania.

Death blasted the dhampire again as he stood, sending him crashing into a cabinet of books that promptly fell backwards. But Alucard was getting sick of this. Rather then standing a second time, he formed into mist and floated into the air. Death's next shot passed through him and hit the wall.

"You are a pest, Alucard. But you can't hold your forms forever, I can wait!"

At that exact moment, Chris entered the library from a nearby door.

"Die, human," Death shouted, annoyed at being interrupted. He swung his aim around and blasted the shotgun at Chris, who was already in the process of diving behind another book cabinet.

This, however, gave Alucard the time he needed to reform and recover. He sheathed his mother's sword in favor of Azagal's Mourneblade, and attacked. Caught off guard, Death tried to swing his shotgun like a club, but missed by a mile. Alucard hacked and slashed, weakening Death while at the same time the Mourneblade stole that strength as Death lost it, and Alucard's wounds started to heal.

Alucard's problem, however, was the Mourneblade had no magical properties to it besides what was restoring his health. It was hurting Death no more then a normal sword would, and despite his almost rabid attacks, it wasn't much against the Reaper.

Death, however, had had enough. The reaper shoved Alucard away and took the moment to levitate higher, putting away his shotgun and grabbing his magnum. He willed a huge scythe to jab into the book cabinet right next to Chris, and it drove him out. Death aimed his gun at the ex-STARS member, who was now in the very wide open.

"I grow tired of this! Come with me right NOW, Alucard, or so help me I'll blow his head in two!"

Alucard stood motionless for a second, and Chris dared not to move with that thing pointing at his head and the bone of Death's finger on the trigger. The dhampire slowly walked forward, placing the Mourneblade back into his magic pocket in resignation. What Death didn't notice, however, was that Alucard also pulled out one of his Tarot cards and managed to slip it under his sleeve before it disappeared.

Much to Death's surprise, a small, floating, flaming skull appeared in front of him. Before the reaper could react, the skull rushed forward and bit into Death's gun hand. More shocked then hurt, Death dropped the magnum and tried to wave away Alucard's Ghost Familiar.

Death roared, "I have had quite enough of you!"

Alucard called his familiar back and drew his sword once more, while Chris pumped his shotgun and blasted Death straight on.

"Very well, you want to be with your humans so much? DIE WITH THEM!"

The reaper gestured, and one if his scythes appeared above the computer Alucard had been sitting at before. The scythe turned so it's tip was facing downward, and moved, pressing the ENTER key on the keyboard.

Death laughed, and disappeared, leaving Chris and Alucard to look at each other, one in confusion, the other already understanding what was going to happen in a few seconds.

---

"The self-destruct sequence has been activated, repeat, the self destruct sequence has been activated, this sequence can not be aborted. This facility will detonate in seven minutes. Main entrance is locked down, all personnel should procede to the helipad immediately."

"I swear if I ever meet that woman I'm going to tear her voice box out," Claire cursed. No sooner had she said that then the actual alarm klaxons began sounding. "Helipad… I know where that is! Let's go."

She lead Leon through several rooms, most of them trashed and crawling with an odd zombie or three, but nothing totally threatening. One room, however, gave them an obstacle; the lights were totally off in the large area, a research lab. The only illumination was from the light in the last room they'd just been through.

"This facility will detonate in six minutes," the computer announced.

"Door's on the right wall," Claire said, trying to feel her way around. Leon stepped ahead of her, taking off his glasses to let his eyes see little details that Claire couldn't. The light switch was next to the door they needed to get to.

Neither of them, in their rush of thoughts amidst the alarms, thought that maybe the lights had been turned off purposely. And the doer of that action was right behind them, silently keeping up as they crept through the wrecked lab.

Wesker saw this as a good opportunity to get what he wanted. Redfield's sister would be the perfect choice, since she'd likely be easier to restrain then her friend AND it would be a good measure of revenge. Quietly, he picked up a chair that had fallen on it's side, hoping the wheels wouldn't creak.

One did, but it wouldn't be loud enough for a human to hear. Wesker pulled it back and hurled it.

Leon suddenly spun around and in one motion, flicked the light switch on the wall and caught the chair before it could slam his head. Claire looked between he and Wesker, trying to figure out what just happened.

"Claire, go."

"But…"

"Now!"

She rolled her eyes and complied, slipping through the door while Leon regarded his attacker. "Lemmie guess… Wesker?"

"This facility will detonate in five minutes," the computer interrupted.

Laughing, Wesker replied "And who might you be?"

"Your evil twin." Leon smiled, putting his glasses back on. He raised his rifle and pulled the trigger, but Wesker would have none of that. He dodged the shot easily and ran in a blur toward Leon. But Wesker was going to get a surprise, since Leon was every bit his equal.

The ex-cop tossed the rifle away and swung an insanely fast punch at his incoming adversary. Wesker ducked under and shoved Leon into the wall, cracking and denting it in, throwing his own punches and catching Leon in the gut. Not to be bested, Leon caught Wesker's arm as he tried for a face shot, and then snapped Wesker in the face with his elbow. Wesker reeled back, unprepared for the force, and Leon kicked him so hard that he flew at least ten feet and rolled over a table.

Wesker quickly rolled to his feet, just in time to see Leon catapult at him from the table he had just toppled over. Wesker grabbed Leon in midair before the ex-cop could make his move and flung him into a bolted-down filing cabinet before kicking him in the ribs, but he hadn't quite caught on that his opponent was as strong as he was just yet, and was caught off guard when Leon rushed at him and hit for all he was worth, sending Wesker ten feet across the room.

Leon didn't stop there. He sped in a blur over the debris of the lab towards Wesker and in passing grabbed a board of wood that had splintered off of something. Wesker stood again, this time it was at the perfect moment to see Leon slam the wood into his face. The board shattered, and Wesker went reeling, encouraging Leon to keep up his attack.

"This facility will detonate in four minutes."

Ducking to the side as Leon threw a punch, Wesker picked up another of the lab's many work desks and hurled it squarely at Leon. But Leon rolled to the side. Wesker tried again with a heavy piece of equipment, prompting Leon to run up the wall and out of it's flight path. Leon dove off the wall at Wesker, pushing off and into him with insane force. The two tumbled through the mess and stood, back at square one.

"Well, now I know what heir Dr. Luccianna's been up to," Wesker laughed, lunging at Leon again. Leon caught his arm and swung his own. Wesker caught it, leaving them deadlocked.

"There's no replacing the original," Wesker mused, being the first to react to the situation by kicking Leon back. He rushed again, but Leon was ready for him. Stepping to the side, Leon caught Wesker and threw him over his head and into the wall.

The door across from where Claire had left opened, letting Chris and Alucard enter the room. Leon and Wesker instinctively froze for a second to see what was going on, and Wesker, realizing he had an opening, recovered first and slammed himself into the ex-cop, sending Leon crashing into the wall near the exit door.

Leon stood quickly, ready for more, when the sounds of explosives and Claire cursing overshadowed the alarms. Apparently, the way to the helipad wasn't totally clear.

"Leon, go!" Chris shouted, knocking Wesker back with a blast from his shotgun. "Go," he motioned to Alucard.

Both complied, Leon retrieving his nearby rifle before running through the door. Chris shot Wesker again, and again, knocking him down. But Wesker got up. Chris pumped the shotgun, pulled the trigger… and click.

"Shit," he muttered. Wesker smiled, and Chris knew exactly what was about to happen. But that didn't mean he could do anything about it. Wesker rushed at him. Chris tried to use the shotgun like a bat, but Wesker stopped dead right in front of him and held his arm up. Chris didn't have Leon's strength, and as such, the weapon harmlessly stopped on Wesker's forearm.

Wesker laughed. And then he punched Chris across the face with the power of 20 men, and each of them would be body-builders. Chris went down hard, and Wesker had guided his follow through so he wouldn't go far.

"This facility will detonate in three minutes."

The ex-STARS officer dragged himself to his feet, prompting Wesker to grab the back of his collar and almost force him down before kneeing him hard in the chest. Laughing, Wesker let Chris fall to his knees.

"You're pathetic, Redfield," Wesker mused. Chris opened his mouth to hurl an insult back, but all he could do was hack up blood; Wesker's blow had broken a few ribs and punctured his lung, and it didn't help any when Wesker grabbed his collar and yanked him up. "You know, I was hoping to get your sister, but I suppose I'll just have to settle for you."

With that, Wesker kicked him. Chris flew across the room at least twice as far as Wesker had managed to knock Leon.

---

"Yeah, come here, I don't have TIME for this," Claire shouted, quickly reloading her grenade launcher. She pointed it in the face of the advancing giant spider and fired, blowing it's small head into atoms. A dead Hunter lay at her feet, and burnt zombie corpses lined one wall. The door leading out of the room burst open, and another Hunter entered.

The creature pounced on her before she could reload her weapon and knocked her down. She hit it across the head with the barrel of the launcher, stunning it for a second, but it wasn't enough. It brought a claw up and jabbed it down, but Claire saw it coming and put the metal of her weapon between the razor-sharp talons and herself. The Hunter was stronger then her, however, and was slowly pushing it's hand down to slowly stab her.

The door she had came through swung open, and before she knew it, the Hunter was off of her. Leon had jumped on it's back and was struggling with it as Alucard helped her up. Leon snapped the Hunter's neck, and they ran on.

"This facility will detonate in two minutes."

The helipad was, thankfully, monster free, and the helicopter was in place. It had seemed like a dead end at first, since the door opened up on the edge of the roof and facing straight ahead, but all was well once everyone actually looked over to the side. The three of them piled in, Leon ending up in the pilot's seat. He started the chopper's engines; this would be close.

"Wait," Claire said, "Where's my brother?!"

Leon snapped his gaze to the door leading out. "He should've been right behind us, unless…"

As if in response to his thought, the door swung open. Claire was visibly relieved. She watched for her brother to step around the door, it was blocking him at the moment…

And she felt her heart skip a beat when Albert Wesker walked out from behind the door, carrying her brother over his shoulder. Chris was unconscious, and blood was trickling from his mouth.

Wesker smiled, right at her specifically, and waved with his free hand before dashing to the side and leaping from the roof.

"Chris!"

She almost jumped out and went after them, her last ounce of sense keeping her back. Leon lifted off the pad and started top fly away as explosions rocked the building, but they were clear by the time the main charges went off and the while facility, including something underground that they hadn't even found, exploded in a ball of fire.

They weren't totally free, however. The helicopter patrolling the area had spotted them, and was moving to intercept. Leon wouldn't have it. He picked up his rifle, aimed, and fired. The round went clean through the window and blew off the other chopper's rear rotor, sending it spinning around and out of control. They weren't high up, however, they'd be able to land.

---

Claire loaded the disc that Death had tossed to Alucard. Chris' laptop had always annoyed her more then anything, but she didn't let that bother her now. It was all she could do not to start breaking things, namely Wesker's neck. But he wasn't around.

To her shock, the disc was genuine. The disc had it all; research material on every virus, orders from the big wigs, specifications on all the planned monsters, even documentation on the Ashfords. It was all here, and it was real. Umbrella would call it fake, but it was real.

---

NEXT: _Meditations on the Abyss_

{Yes, now I'm ripping off Babylon 5. ~_~;;}


	3. Meditations on the Abyss

Part three is divided into two solely for suspense. Note that the next part will be part 3**C **for reasons that you'll find out if I decide to follow through with the idea I got; there is, however, nothing being missed "in between."

** **

---

** **

**Resident Evil: Demon Rising, part 3a**

# Meditations on the Abyss

---

"I swear Chris, if we survive all of this, I'm buying you a CD writer," Claire said to herself, putting the last fresh floppy disc into her brother's laptop to continue copying the CD.

"We'll get him back, Claire," Leon assured her. She responded by ejecting the last disc and banding them together with a rubber band. Leon, now that Claire had a backup copy just in case, took the CD and tucked it away into his coat.

The front door provided the next source of tension for everyone; someone was trying to get inside. It was probably Chris' friends, but taking no risks was something everyone had gotten used to.

Alucard formed into mist and floated into the living room, staying right behind the door. Claire opted to leave the light on and duck behind the counter, while Leon opened pantry door into the kitchen and hid behind it.

The front door swung open, swirling Alucard about in all directions, but he steadied himself after two people walked inside and closed the door behind them. They stepped cautiously through the darkness toward the light of the kitchen, and Alucard kept behind them, noticed only as an increase in humidity.

Leon pushed the door closed when he was sure they were in the kitchen. Claire jumped out at the same time, both pointing their weapons at the intruders.

And Claire then relaxed, seeing that the 'intruders' were indeed Chris' friends, Jill Valentine and Barry Burton. She'd even met Barry on occasion. Leon, seeing Claire's reaction, put his weapon down, and Jill and Barry did the same.

---

"Well, he sort of… got away… are you angry? You look angry…"

Count Dracula answered by turning around and letting loose one of the larger blasts of energy that anyone would ever see. Said energy hit Death squarely in the chest and continued to push him along, as if he was in the way, into the window. The window smashed immediately, and the energy blast curved and kept coming, pushing Death down the many stories between Dracula's office and the beach below the precipice that Castlevania sat on.

When all was said and done, the reaper was buried into the sand, one bony hand sticking up. "Yup. Definitely angry…"

"Did you bring one of them?"

"Yes," Wesker answered quickly, opting not to make any unnecessary sounds.

"How long will it take to synthesize the full dose?"

"A few hours. The process will become much faster once it's done once."

"Go."

Wesker left, leaving Dracula to his thoughts. The Count was displeased.

"Curse you Death… you never could hold that temper… I should have Wesker bring him back… ha! If someone told me centuries ago that a human would be more dependable… bah, what does it matter. Wesker can still do it."

Wesker himself was currently in the most enjoyable mood that was humanly, or inhumanly possible. His testing lab was relatively small, and was actually the room he'd rose from the grave in, thanks to Dr. Luccianna. He remembered that particular moment vividly; his body had been frozen so he wouldn't decay before she finished her research, and as a result he's woken up a partially thawed gutted dhampire. But that dhampirism had fixed him pretty fast. Death must've had a blast teleporting into the Tyrant room of Trevor's mansion to grab him just before the whole thing blew.

He plucked a syringe from the counter; already filled with the chemical he needed, and pulled the top off. The liquid inside was a translucent green, and it seemed to swirl around with a life of it's own.

The dhampire studied his guinea pig for a second. Chris was tied down like he had been when Luccianna had revived him; she had anticipated that it would be quite a shock. Chris wasn't going to be going anywhere, not if Wesker was right about what'd he'd done to him, but then, the original Tyrant wasn't supposed to turn on him either.

"Hope your sense of irony is intact Redfield, personally I don't know whether to laugh or cry at this," he mused, searching for the artery on Chris' neck and rubbing it with alcohol before he jabbed the needle in and injected the liquid.

No sooner had Wesker pulled out the syringe then Chris regained consciousness.

"Well, nice to see this works," Wesker commented aloud, tossing the used instrument into a trashcan.

"Go to hell," Chris gasped, unable to even breath without feeling his injuries ten-fold.

"It'll be awhile, Chris," Wesker answered. "You should thank me! Internal bleeding and punctured lungs tend to kill people. You'll be pleased to know that the stuff I just shot into your body is the first part of a serum that'll fix those little ailments. Pretty amusing, isn't it? You'd be six feet under if it wasn't for me…"

"I'd rather be dead," Chris breathed out. He could actually feel his breathing become more normal, but apparently his broken bones were remaining broken.

"Oh, I know you would, Chris," Wesker answered. "Frankly, I'd rather you were dead too. But alas, sacrifices must be made. Now then, I might as well see what exactly I broke while that starts working, if it does what it's supposed to do it should leave your breaks for something else to fix."

Chris felt a shock of pain in his chest; Wesker was feeling around to see what was broken and was making every effort to make it as painful as possible.

"Your sister would've been a lot more amusing during this. But alas, circumstances forced me to settle for your sorry ass."

"Wesker," Chris breathed out, "I swear, if I live long enough for my bones to knit, I'll kill with my bare hands…"

"You wish," Wesker shot back. Without another thought he brought his hand up and slammed his palm down on Chris, on a rib broken in two places.

Chris bit his tongue to keep from crying out, still refusing to give Wesker any satisfaction. He couldn't tell if the blood in his mouth was from Wesker's little torture or if he just bit down too hard.

"You know what, Redfield? When I'm done with you, you'll be more important then I could ever dream of being… stronger too, stronger then me, stronger then Luccianna's other play toy, certainly stronger then that fool Alucard, and I hate you even more for it. But be that as it may," Wesker paused, grabbing another syringe and injecting the second part of the regenerative compound into Chris, "it'll take a little while for this serum to finish working it's magic, literally. I should be quite ready to procede at that time. You know I originally studied biology to make the world a better place? I I'm actually going to do it for once."

"Bull… shit," Chris coughed. "Whatever you're doing… it's still wrong… and you know it!"

"Ah, the last, tortured cries of the damned."

Leaving Chris with those words, Wesker walked passed the Sword Lords he'd posted as guards… and almost walked into Count Dracula as he turned a corner in the corridor. 

"Death has failed me, TWICE," the Count said, slowly walking toward Wesker, backing him into the wall. "I've made it ABUNDENTLY clear how important this is," he went on, staring down the shorter man. "Find my son, bring him here, right NOW!"

With that, he vanished. Wesker promptly left without another thought, heading for Castlevania's library.

---

"Wesker's still alive… can't believe it," Barry muttered, pacing around. "Backstabbing, greedy bastard…"

"I don't know what's weirder, the fact that he isn't working for Umbrella anymore or the fact that he's alive after having his stomach clawed out," Jill added. "All of this is turning from horror to a weird fiction novel."

"Yeah, Lovecraft, eat your heart out," Claire answered. "You know, Chris would've been dead in that lab if Wesker didn't need him for something. Or maybe Wesker just wants to make sure none of us gets on his back like we did to Umbrella."

"My father's motives may not be what I am accustomed to," added Alucard. "But I could not see him changing his actual methods. If that were his intention, he would be more direct and simply try to destroy us all. Your friend is required for his plans."

"Whatever," Leon interjected. "Look, Claire, you want your brother back? I might be able to help."

"How so?"

"Castlevania Pharmaceuticals was next in line after Umbrella to get some 'attention' from us. I think my superiors would be pleased if I had a willing team, ready and able, to go and deal some hurt. Your brother as motivation is of little significance in the big picture. We could actually leave right now, if we wanted, the transport I took here is nearby, complete with Doc Luccianna doubling as pilot." 

"She sounds like more of a jack-of-all-trades then a bio-chemist," Barry mused.

"Oh, you haven't seen her testing R&D's new weapons. Anyway, trying to get Chris back is better then sitting around and waiting for them to come to us, which I don't think would be very pleasant."

"I would agree," Alucard added. "The sooner we do something, the better. And, this doctor… is she well versed on, how shall I put this, medical abnormalities?"

"I would think so, I doubt she'd be working with the same people I am if she didn't make the best in her field look like first graders. Why?"

"A… friend of mine needs help, that I can not provide. I'm hoping your doctor could." 

---

Leon's 'transport' was within walking distance, but Alucard insisted that he had to make a detour to the mausoleum where he'd woken up. Jill and Claire went with him, more out of curiosity then anything else.

The old chamber remained as it had since Claire and Death recently tried to kill each other. The top of Alucard's coffin lay flat on the ground, discarded when the dhampire woke up. The second coffin, however, remained undisturbed.

"Huh, I'd forgotten about this in all the excitement," Claire joked. Alucard was leaning on the stone, brushing off some sand that had gathered on top.He was staring off again, thinking briefly of times long past. And then he gripped the cover and heaved the stone off and onto the floor.

Jill looked into the cold stone, and drew in a sharp breath at what she saw; a girl, younger then her, comprised the contents of the old stone. She was dressed in simple green clothes with the same Victorian look as Alucard's, although none of it had any sort of enchantment like the dhampire's cloak.

Alucard seemed visibly relieved at her condition, although it looked to Jill like her 'condition' was death. She instinctively put her fingers to the girl's neck, and she was even more surprised when she found a pulse.

"Who…"

"Her name is Maria," Alucard explained. "Maria Renard. She did not want me to sleep for centuries once more, but I would not allow her to persuade me otherwise, so she convinced me to put her to sleep beside me… I don't know why I agreed, but my spell is not designed for humans, and I can not wake her back up."

Claire tapped her on the shoulder from behind. Jill absently registered it and turned around, but she received a much ruder shock from the new sight.

Because Claire hadn't tapped her on the shoulder at all, Albert Wesker had. He was trying to restrain Claire, and although the Redfield was making him fight for every second of her silence, he was succeeding very well.

"Surprise," he shouted, almost joyfully. Without another word, he hurled Claire into Jill and sent them tumbling over the now-open coffin. Alucard snarled and dived at Wesker, not thinking to draw his sword. Wesker dashed to the side, prompting Alucard to give chase. The dhampire didn't notice the thin card in Wesker's hand.

Alucard punched Wesker across the face, sending him reeling, and grabbed him by his black vest to stand him straight up for another hit. In reality, he had just made Wesker's life a whole lot easier. The old STARS Captain thumbed the card in his hand, and Alucard finally saw it. But he was two late to prevent both of them from vanishing in a flash of light.

---

"What happened?"

"Wesker," Claire answered Leon, rubbing at her shoulder, which had crashed into stone in the mausoleum. "As if Chris wasn't enough, the weird guy's gone now, too."

They could see Leon's transport now, hidden in a think clearing. It was like the evolved offspring of small blimps. The aircraft was about 25 meters long, designed for speed and to hold a lot of people while at the same time having a lot of room to move around inside.

Jill had opted to carry the sleeping girl through the forest. She laid quietly in her arms, sort of weirding her out a little. It wasn't every day one carted a bona-fide sleeping beauty to a government-made UFO.

---

Alucard was not pleased when he materialized in front of the oak desk in front of the master librarian of Castlevania. He flung Wesker into a wall, but the manmade dhampire was only fazed a little and quickly stood.

"Oh, Master Alucard! What can I do for you?"

The old librarian was still himself, to the point where he had sold Wesker one of his magical Library cards. Alucard totally ignored the old man and instead drew his sword and turned to Wesker. The blond man was just smiling oddly.

But the reason for Wesker's glee suddenly presented itself. From behind, a hand brushed past Alucard's cloak and seemed to disappear. He felt Mourneblade being pulled out from his magical pocket, and his mind connected that fact with the one person he knew of who was strong enough to break into his magical seal and actually swipe something.

Alucard didn't think, he simply spun around and swung his sword with all the force he could muster. It might have succeeded if Count Dracula wasn't expecting him to do just that and had Mourneblade perfectly held to stop Alucard's sword.

"It's a good sword," Vlad mused, casually examining the Mourneblade.

"You shall find it not as good as Mother's," Alucard shot, pulling his blade back and attacking his father. But Dracula was every bit the swordsman as Alucard and easily kept up with his son, forcing him into a full-on duel and keeping it going across the library.

"Shall you never give up, Father?"

"No," Dracula mused, parrying several of Alucard's strikes. Some of the CP researchers looking for a few of the more wordy books had become interested in the little fight and an audience was forming at what they thought was a safe distance from the two.

"You shouldn't have brought me here Father," Alucard shouted, stepping back as Dracula swung, causing Mourneblade to slice a few books on a shelf in half. "It will now be your undoing!"

"Like I've never heard THAT before," Dracula quipped, pointing his arm out and knocking the dhampire back with a well-placed fireball. "I think it's amusing, my son, that you denounce me with such passion yet you take my name as your own. Is that not amusing, _Alucard?_"

"My use of your name signifies my very defiance of it," Alucard shot back, parrying several strikes from his father. "I believed even your narrow mind could grasp that."

"Oh it does, Adrian, it does. But it's still _my_ name."

Alucard, for the first time, had no response. Dracula had talked him into a corner with that one. The why did Alucard feel like it was actually making him think…

"You may be conscious, Alucard," Dracula mused, taking a nick on his shoulder from his son's blade. "But you need a very LARGE wake up call. I have no intention of trying to go through the 20th century's defenders in an unholy war against humanity. The humans, they have a saying now, 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em.' And I'm joining them. Granted, by performing acts that are largely illegal under their laws, but I'm joining the others who do so at least."

"I have seen what your 'competitors' do, Dracula. I have no interest in joining you in twisting nature."

"Let's just say we're as natural as they come nowadays."

The two drew their swords back and lunged, clashing blades in the middle and trying to overpower the other. Dracula was usually stronger, being a full vampire, but Alucard's determination to defeat his father kept the blades an equal distance between the two.

"Come now Adrian, would you at least LISTEN to what I have to say? I promise you, if you still refuse to stand at my side after knowing the whole story I will not object."

"You are one to make promises, Father," Alucard replied, but the spite was gone from his voice. The dhampire drew back quickly and sheathed his sword, telling himself that he was just doing this out of curiosity, that he would stab his father in the back the first chance he got. "Very well."

---

"And how are we feeling Chris," Wesker mocked as he stepped into his lab. As he expected, Chris was still tightly strapped to his operating table. His lung would be healed, but the ribs would still be broken. They wouldn't be for long, however.

Chris didn't respond, trying his damnedest to spite Wesker in any way he could.

"Still that bad, eh Redfield? Oh well, you're in perfect shape for what I have in store… it's taken me months to perfect this, you know," he spoke, pulling a syringe from his pocket. It was filled with yet another different colored liquid.

"But alas, with only some blood samples to work with, it was doomed to fail. Stealing the G-Virus from Umbrella helped, but Birkin's toy wasn't advanced enough to solve every single problem, so I had to follow your sister and chase after that bitch Alexia. Going through hell with that she-devil again almost wasn't worth it, but I needed the T-Veronica virus. And after all that trouble, you'd better believe I've made good use of it."

Chris' curiosity got the better of him as the unseen Wesker pulled the cap off of the needle.

"How…?"

"How did I get the T-Veronica virus? That was a blast in itself…"

---

# "At last, I've found you Alexia!"

_ _

_Wesker was ecstatic; he couldn't believe his luck, finding the girl here where there was nothing else to interfere with him. He could sense Chris hiding somewhere, but Redfield didn't dare do anything but watch._

_ _

_"You're responsible for the T-Veronica virus, and now the only sample of it is in your body! I want it! NOW!"_

_ _

_"You want it," Alexia laughed, an evil, piercing laugh. "You are not WORTHY of it's power!"_

_ _

_Staring in awe, Wesker found he couldn't move as Alexia walked down the stairs and burst into flames; her transformation was almost hypnotic._

_ _

_She was right in front of him before he knew it. And she casually batted at him with the back of her hand. He didn't expect to be hit with the force of an eighteen-wheeler going a hundred miles an hour._

_ _

_Wesker careened off the stairs in a backward flipping motion, blood pouring from a broken lip, and landed face-first on the marble floor of the mansion-replica._

_ _

_"Ahhhh… what power," he sputtered, forcing himself to stand. Alexia hopped off the stairs and landed in front of him. She slapped him again, this time sending him up and into the wall. Her hand had actually lacerated his cheek._

_ _

_He looked up to see that Alexia had noticed Chris' hiding spot. So that's where he was, Wesker had guessed the upper floor when he felt his presence, no matter. Alexia was distracted and he took the opportunity to dash out the door and listen to the shots that Chris must have fired not long after._

_ _

_Later, Wesker had made his exit in the submarine. It finally came to him why it was suggested that he get the sample exactly as he had, in a discreet fashion. Going toe-to-toe with Alexia would have been very bad._

_ _

_He held a cloth to his face, soaking up the blood that leaked from his injury. More importantly, he was preserving the cells that had rubbed off of Alexia's hand and onto his skin via friction when she'd slapped him.Some simple duplication magic from Count Dracula, and the T-Veronica virus was his..._

---

"And now that you've enjoyed story time, Chris," Wesker mused. "It's time for me to get to work."

Chris could feel Wesker rubbing something on the inside of his elbow. A second later he could smell the alcohol, and feel the needle going in. He half-expected to go through the experience that Leon had related, but surprisingly, it didn't hurt at all.

In fact, it almost felt soothing.

---

"Hmmm… and you just sort of… found her?"

"Yep."

Dr. Luccianna, having set the aircraft on autopilot, leaned over Maria's prone form to begin an examination. After the basics, shining a light in her eyes and the like, the doctor hooked an EKG on her and glimpsed at the heart rate. 

"Dis is interesting," she commented, grabbing a bottle from inside a shelf and soaking one side of a cloth with it. "The utter simplicity of dis is almost scary."

She held the cloth over Maria's nose and mouth for a second, and quickly drew it away when the girl snapped awake and sat up.

"What? Hah… Alucard…?

She blinked rapidly and stood, hands outstretched a little, apparently she couldn't see right away.

"Easy now, calm down miss, you are vith friends," Luccianna tried to comfort her; taking a gentle hold of her arm so she wouldn't stumble.

"Who are you? Where is Alucard," she asked, almost frantically.

"He isn't here right now," Claire offered. "Count Dracula took him, we were hoping you could help us get him back."

Leon opened his mouth to say something, but Claire elbowed him in the stomach so he wouldn't throw her off. If Alucard's friend ended up telling the same story as he had, this might calm her down.

And it did.

"What is the year?"

"Here we go again," Leon commented as Claire told her.

---

Alucard had paced around outside of his father's office for a half hour, the time seeming like the obligatory eternity. His thoughts were a jumble; he wanted so very badly to trust is father…

That thought stopped when Dracula walked out and motioned for him to follow. The age-old vampire still held the Mourneblade in one hand and lead Alucard to an elevator and through a few hallways, ultimately stopping at door and motioning for his son to go in first.

Vlad Dracula smiled for the second time in recent days, like it was the start of a new trend. He tossed the Mourneblade over Alucard's head from behind. The dhampire's eyes grew wide with confusion when he saw who was in the room to catch the sword.

Wesker simply laughed, and Dracula sighed when his son turned back to him and glared with a look that said one word; explain.

---

# Next: Castle of the Damned


	4. Castle of the Damned

A little note about the whole 3b/3c thing, forget it. When I decided I wanted to go through with it, I realized that there was absolutely no reason to letter them oddly, and it would probably be confusing as hell too. So never mind. ^_^

Special thanks to Cloud Strife and Princess Artemis. :)

**Resident Evil: Demon Rising, part 3b**

# Castle of the Damned

_ _

---

"You've gotta be kidding."

"Trust me, dey vill vork," Luccianna insisted. "You don't have to believe de vampire stuff if you don't vant to, scientifically, I could explain all de reasons vhy dey have dis reaction. Jab one of these into Vesker or Dracula's heart and they're gone."

Relenting, Leon took small leather pouch that held a pair of stakes. They were both eighteen inches long, and made of pure silver. The pouch had buckles to keep them from stabbing through the bottom.

"Oh, be careful vith Vesker though, he's still part human so he can survive it if you don't stake him like dere's no tomorrow."

"I'll remember that," Leon responded, shoving the silver under a strap on the inside of his coat. "What are you giving Claire, garlic?"

"Actually, I gave her and Jill a couple of tactical nuclear grenades."

---

Only the TV screen lighted the dark office. Nicholai wasn't in the mood for light; the news he was watching was far too depressing.

Umbrella was sinking pretty fast. Someone had gotten enough evidence to rat the company out, and measures were being taken against them. He could care less about that.

Nicholai would simply miss the money. He could easily vanish and never be found, but Umbrella paid well. Maybe one of their rivals would hire a former Umbrella employee…

Hearing a knock at the door, Nicholai picked up his handgun and stood, not wanting to be caught off guard. Even he had made a few enemies while working for Umbrella, and with the company in serious legal trouble, he wasn't going to take any chances.

Flicking the light on, the Russian opened the door.

"Long time no see, Nicholai."

"Hunk," Nicholai answered. "What do you want?"

"Umbrella's about to go flop, I figured I'd see how my old friend is doing," Hunk smiled. "Who knows, maybe we could both ditch this place and find some new occupations. Gotta be openings somewhere for hired gunmen, eh?"

"Perhaps," Nicholai answered, turning around to shut off the TV. He was tired of hearing the same thing over and over again.

But he wasn't going to be hearing much of everything, because Hunk, one of the few people Nicholai had risked trusting over the years, shot him in the back of the head.

"Sorry my friend, I'm afraid you can't be around to tell people I exist."

With the last man that personally knew him at Umbrella dead, Death disappeared in a warp of black, seconds before nearby security guards ran into the room.

---

"The greatest thing in the world, I think, is man's inability to comprehend everything," Wesker mused to himself. His feet were up, he was juggling his glasses around in one hand. He was almost antsy, wanting desperately to do something, but at the same time proud of his recent accomplishment.

"You delivered that so wrong it isn't funny," Hunk suddenly answered, materializing in the room.

"Oh get a life!"

"I can't believe you just said that," Hunk answered.

"Neither can I," Wesker laughed.

"So do you think they'll come?"

"Bet on it," Wesker answered, standing up. "If Redfield's sister is anything like he is, she'd at the very least come after him alone. But I doubt her friends wouldn't go with her."

"Just as well, now that Umbrella's not going to be around, it'll make our lives a little easier to kill them all at once."

A chime sounded from a panel in the table, and Count Dracula's voice soon followed.

"Wesker, is Death with you?"

Wesker flipped a switch in the intercom, "He is."

The screen embedded in one of the walls flared to life, displaying the feed from a security camera in the lobby. Wesker and Hunk could clearly make out Claire Redfield, Leon Kennedy and a girl dressed in green talking with the receptionist, probably trying to get further into the castle without making noise.

It didn't seem to work. The two went past the desk and ignored the receptionist, only to be stopped by security guards. Leon took the liberty of knocking them down in two seconds flat while onlookers backed off.

"The others are coming by air," Dracula continued. "Split up and dispose of them once and for all. Lead them to us if you have to."

"Damned Belmonts!" Hunk suddenly yelled, pulling his shotgun and blowing a hole through the screen, specifically at where Maria was shown. "Damn them and their never ending families…"

"Was that really necessary?"

"No, but I enjoyed it," Hunk snapped. "I'll get the ones from the air."

With that, Hunk vanished.

---

"Sir, step away from the elevator."

Leon didn't bother answering the new security guard when he felt the gun on the back of his head. He swung around faster then the ordinary human could pull the trigger and backhanded him across the face, while Maria right-hooked the other with an oddly- burning fist. They took the opportunity to grab the elevator. With the keycard that Luccianna had used in the building, they were on their way to the laboratories.

Something _thumped_, like something had fallen on the top of the elevator just as it stopped. The trio walked out of it slowly, keeping their eyes on the ceiling in case something was up.

It almost seemed like nothing was wrong as they stepped into the waiting room beyond. And then Wesker smashed through the elevator's roof.

"Keep going, he's Leon's," Claire, almost casually, informed Maria. The two ducked through separate doors as they'd discussed when going over the castle's floor plan. Leon had gone with them on the very idea that Wesker would likely come after the party going through the front doors.

"Isn't it funny how we keep running into each other," Wesker smirked, cracking his knuckles. "I hope you understand, you aren't going to leave here alive."

Leon pulled his glasses off. "Oh I understand more then you know. I understand that I'm going to kick your ass so hard that Count Dracula, assuming he even exists, is going feel it."

"Cute," Wesker answered before rushing forward.

---

"Laboratories… he wouldn't be here," Maria mumbled to herself, remembering her intended rout from the floor plan. Castlevania was quite a bit similar to it's last incarnation, but there were still differences. The Chapel would have been her first guess as to Alucard's location, but the castle had no chapel at all this time around.

First she had to find her way out of the laboratories, the strangely empty laboratories, filled with machines the likes of which she'd never dreamed of but totally devoid of people. She'd went through one room with large glass cases mounted on the walls, some of them empty, some filled with things simply not human, and it had given her an idea of what Count Dracula had been up to.

It wasn't long before she found out _why_ no one was in the labs. A clanking sound reached her ears from another room. It grew louder, like metal feet were walking toward her. Several pairs of them, in fact. Maria held her ground, and a near-invincible Guardian rounded a corner. Another came through a door. A third knocked down a wall in an adjacent room. As if being outnumbered wasn't enough, she was outmatched by any one of them.

So she struck first, eager to get every advantage she could against her foes. She dashed at one and baited it into swinging it's sword at her neck. When it did, she jumped back and pushed her hands toward it, conjuring an iridescent, fiery Tiger at her adversary. It jumped directly into the Guardian, setting an unnatural fire to it's armor and reeling it back.

Another one was walking up behind her. Maria judged where it was by the sound of it's footsteps, and flipped backward into the air. The Guardian swung at where she had been, expecting her to still be there, but she was in the air and jumping off of it's head by the time it realized that it had missed.

Landing behind it, Maria prepared another magic attack. Her hand-to-hand combat skills wouldn't dent Guardians; her only hope would be to stay free of their attacks long enough to power up her more powerful spells.

Lumbering around, the Guardian found itself on the business end of an iridescent magical dragon flying through the air. It swirled around the armored demon, melting through the gold-colored mail and snapping it in two. The dragon went on to rush at the guardian that Maria had set on fire and coiled around, engulfing it. When the apparition vanished, the guardian was a pile of singed armor and ash. They were so slow that she'd managed to destroy two of them in that many spells.

# Two…!

_ _

Her mind quickly remembered that there had been three. She spun around on reflex, just in time to see the last guardian raise it's sword, ready to strike. A feint sound reached her ears, like metal destroying metal. The Guardian's arm wobbled, it's sword fell from it's hand, and then it's torso fell from it's legs.

The demon's massive size had obscured Alucard from view. Maria exhaled the breath she'd been holding.

"Alucard!"

"Hello, Maria," answered the dhampire. Something was in his voice, an edge, an uncertainty. Maria's face fell once more as she realized something was off.

"What do you here? I'd have thought you a prisoner," she asked, trying to figure out what had him bugged.

"But when are any of us not prisoners, not victims of circumstance, not forced to choose between a lesser of two evils…"

He paced around as he talked, his arm fidgeting with his sword. Maria didn't understand at first, but as a realization slowly sank in she let Alucard talk, praying she wasn't hearing him right, that he would say something totally different then she was expecting.

"And how often," he started, his eyes suddenly fixing themselves on the blade of his sword as if they wanted to focus on anything besides her. His voice lowered to a whisper, barely audible.

"How often," Alucard breathed, finally looking at Maria. "Do we see eye to eye with family?"

Feeling her stomach knot, Maria brought herself to ask a simple question. "Why?"

"Because sometimes people change, Maria. You can understand that, can't you? I changed you know, long before you were born. And now my father's changed. Please Maria, walk away. I promise you, it is not what you think..."

"I can not," she answered, trying to keep her voice steady and failing to do so. "I can not… and you know it, Alucard. I'm sorry, I was raised to hunt vampires… you are so different from your father, but your father is Count Dracula, and I can't leave him be, no matter what."

"As you wish," the dhampire answered, raising his sword. "If that is your choice, then have at you!"

---

"Think they heard us?"

"Are you kidding," Barry chuckled, watching their ride fly away from the castle under Luccianna's control. "You could be front row at a rock concert and hear that thing. Noisiest-"

The door that led from the helipad into the building opened, prompting Jill and Barry to raise their guns. Claire walked out onto the platform.

"Great, I took a wrong turn somewhere," she lamented. "This place is a maze."

"Well thank you for getting lost," Hunk sounded from atop the lone helicopter on the pad, making his presence known. "Makes my job easier with three of you together."

Barry raised his colt and pulled the trigger as Hunk dropped down, but the reaper was expecting it and rolled to the side as soon as he hit the floor. Barry dived to the side himself when his target raised a magnum and fired back. Claire pulled her handgun and ran around in a wide circle in the opposite direction Barry had dived in, hoping to outflank Hunk. She took a shot at him as soon as he turned to her, and his arm took the bullet.

---

Leon feinted to the side, causing Wesker's fist to go through the wall. He let Wesker swing again and ducked underneath, grabbing his adversary and flinging him into the adjacent wall. Wesker shouted a muffled curse as he pulled his head out, his glasses now broken once again.

Leon took hold of his vest and tossed him hard into the ceiling, spreading a web of cracks in the old stone before he dropped to the floor.

"Not bad," Wesker chuckled, getting up and tossing his glasses away. "Need some work on the throw."

Before Leon could react, Wesker kicked him hard, careful on the follow-through to ensure that Leon would double over rather then be knocked from his feet. The ex-STARS threw Leon at the ceiling like he'd just been thrown himself, except Leon went clean through the hard stone and banged into the wall in the room above. He jumped up as Leon became aware of his surroundings.

Wesker quickly found that Leon wasn't down for the count, however. He swung a kick to his face, but Leon caught his ankle and hurled him into the side of a table.

"You're right, the throw needed work"

Angered, Wesker sprung up and attacked. It was clear to him that, superhuman strength or not, he had more experience in hand-to-hand combat then Leon and he was taking advantage of it. Leon swung a fist, prompting Wesker to duck under, jam himself into Leon, run him through the wall and into the next. Before his opponent could right himself, Wesker punched him in the side, then did it again, and again, repeating it so fast his arms were a blur. He stopped and let Leon keel over.

---

Alucard swung his sword at Maria's neck, but she was far too quick for that. Alucard's response to her dodging underneath his blade was to backhand her across the face and knock her down. She spun on her back and threw her leg up, kicking his head with her heavy boot. He spun to the side involuntarily.

Before the dhampire could reorient, Maria jumped to her feet. Raising her hands, she summoned a magical eagle that raked it's claws across his back. The enchanted cloak remained undamaged but it didn't prevent the claws from digging into his skin.

With Alucard distracted even further, Maria prepared her dragon once more. The dhampire turned toward again as she finished the spell, just in time to see the transient blue creature form and fly at him.

But Maria was going to get a surprise. Alucard jumped back as the dragon approached, gaining some distance. He held his arm out, and his family shield materialized in front of him. Propping himself against the wall and holding it out, Alucard let the mystic beast seek it's target.

The dragon barreled head first into his shield, pushing him hard against the wall. But it didn't get through; instead it dissipated as it struck the metal, unable to break the defense. Maria's strongest attack hadn't worked.

---

Death was getting angry, and as such, he was getting reckless. Barry took a shot straight for his head, but he vanished before the bullet could strike only to reappear behind Jill. She felt his presence and turned, but he grabbed her by the neck and lifted.

Claire had just pulled her grenade launcher, and if she missed, it'd blow her to kingdom come. Barry had to reload; that left Jill on her own for a few seconds, a few seconds that Hunk could kill her in.

So she dropped her gun and pulled her own grenade launcher off of her back. Praying she'd loaded it with a composite round, she jabbed it into Hunk's gut and pulled the trigger. The resulting explosion threw him into a wall and threw her a few feet back.

The round was, indeed, composite, with a shaped explosive that gave her minimal splash damage. The trio grouped and prepared to knock Hunk right back down if he got up again. And he stood, skin melting away in some places, with a black cloak suddenly draped around him. He seemed to just now notice it, and for some reason became agitated.

"Damn you," he shouted, pulling a scythe and throwing it. It spun through the air toward Claire, but Hunk had been careless and it missed by several feet before she even realized she was under attack.

Angrier then ever, Hunk raised the magnum and pulled the trigger.

_Click._

_ _

He fumbled for a clip, but not fast enough. Barry emptied his Colt into the Reaper, knocking him back to the edge of the helipad. Claire and Jill loaded their grenade launchers, with a fire round and Luccianna's thermonuclear charge respectively. Claire fired first, setting the reaper ablaze.

Hunk didn't seem to overly mind the heat, but he wasn't expecting the absurd blast that obliterated half of the spire next to him and actually moved the helicopter a few feet. The reaper seemed to have been totally vaporized, much to everyone's delight.

But Death wasn't dead, not by a long shot. His scythe appeared out of nowhere and spun around in the air, while the reaper, no longer in a remotely human form, re-appeared.

"You mortals _couldn't_ _possibly piss me off _any more then you've already done," Death yelled from his unmoving skull. His eye sockets glowed a deep red, and scythes of all shapes and sizes started to materialize around him.

"Who wants to see if Death can die," Claire muttered, shoving her own uber-grenade into the barrel of her weapon. Aiming before Death had a chance to launch his offensive, she pulled the trigger. The blast, just as large as the one from Jill's grenade earlier, didn't seem to have any effect on Death at first.

But without warning, his scythes all dropped to the floor. The robed skeletal thing started convulsing, all the while shouting curses in old Romanian far worse then modern day vituperations.

A flash of light blinded the humans as Death, beaten too much without having had enough time to recover from his battle with Alucard, lost his ability to manifest. The light cleared, and the reaper was once again denied access to the land of the living.

---

Leon braced himself for another blow from Wesker, but it never came. As if it were cued, Wesker suddenly forgot about Leon and looked off into space.

"…Death?"

Not bothering to think on what the ex-STARS was mumbling about, Leon swung a right hook and knocked Wesker flat on his back. And he didn't stop there. Before Wesker could rise, Leon planted his foot in his enemy's gut before dragging him up and hurling him into a door. The fragile wood shattered like most walls the two had been through, and Wesker stumbled into a room on the castle's perimeter.

Leon went for broke. The room had a large, stained glass window on the far side and he'd be damned if Wesker wasn't going to go through it. He dashed ahead and barreled into his adversary, stopping dead just before the window. Wesker had no idea where he was and went straight through. An odd gust of wind breezed through from the outside.

Looking over, Leon became perplexed. Wesker had gone flying out the window, yet he was hanging by one hand on a ledge a few feet directly below. And there was something on his back.

"Oh that's funny," Wesker taunted, refusing to give Leon an edge even now.

"Yeah, I thought so myself," Leon smiled. "I don't suppose you'll just let go and spare me the trouble of climbing out and stomping?"

"When Hell freezes over kid," Wesker commented, shooting Leon an evil grin. "Speaking of Hell, I have a friend who'd be happy to show you the weather there."

Before he could say anything, Leon was assaulted by what was literally a tentacle of smoke that grew spontaneously from Wesker's back. The stuff wrapped around his wait and actually yanked him from the window and into the night.

The ex-cop managed to snag a ledge just above Wesker and to the right.

"That's the _best you could do!?_" Wesker snarled, seemingly at no one. An ethereal, disembodied voice answered him.

"_I can't even manifest anymore, what do you expect?_"

Death.

Looking over, Leon saw what exactly it was on Wesker's back. His vest was now painted with a grungy, scythe wielding mug shot of the reaper, one hand holding the scythe at one side and the other balled into a bony fist.

Wesker switched his hands on the ledge and swung at Leon, clipping him in the side. He couldn't reach high enough to effectively land a blow, and Leon had an advantage. He kicked Wesker right in the face, jarring but not knocking him from his grip.

Wesker reached and steadied himself by grabbing the ledge with his other hand. That accomplished, he swung and tried to grab Leon in a scissor lock with his legs to pull him off, but for all his strength Wesker didn't have the agility to pull it off.

Leon kicked him again, this time aiming for his elbow. He hit Wesker's forearm instead, knocking his hand from the ledge and bringing the ex-STARS to the same position he had just been in.

Looking up, Leon noticed his ledge had a corner to it, and it protruded about 6 inches from the castle wall. It wasn't an overly large space, but he managed to maneuver himself around the edge and end up facing Wesker from his perch.

"So what were you saying about Hell?"

Wesker looked over. He had been about to grab onto the ledge with his other hand again when Leon took an insane risk. The ex-cop swung up and dropped down, gaining momentum, before he let go of the ledge and barreled right into Wesker with a drop kick.

Leon grabbed onto the ledge Wesker had been holding and watched his enemy fall. To his credit, the only sound Wesker made was an 'oomph' of surprise as he bounced off the castle wall.

But Wesker wasn't done yet. Far from Leon's sight, he reached toward the wall and let his arm smash through the pattern of ledges until he finally snagged an open windowsill. A normal human would have torn in half from the sudden stop.

"You want Hell, kid? I'll give you Hell," he muttered to himself, his hand clutching the pair of silver stakes he'd torn from Leon when they'd connected.

---

"Why can't you leave, Maria," Alucard almost snarled, having assaulted Maria constantly, trying to get her to run. But she wouldn't yield. "Why can't you let this rest?!"

"Because it's who I am, Alucard," she snarled as Alucard raised his sword, backing her up into the wall. "I realize what faces you, but can't you see… whatever your father is doing… it's still wrong!"

"What… what did you say," Alucard mumbled, his posture suddenly sagging, his sword dangling in his hand to the point where it dropped and clattered on the floor. She'd hit a nerve even _he _didn't he had.

Not wasting her chance, Maria dashed forward and swung her arm. Alucard didn't even seem to notice her fist, blazing with enchanted fire, swing at him, but he felt it when she punched him across the jaw.

Maria knocked Alucard down _hard_ with that. The dhampire landed on the floor with a slight ebb of consciousness, he would be in la la land for a few minutes before his above-average healing abilities woke him up fully.

Maria took the chance to run through the room as fast as she could, slamming the door behind her and not stopping until she'd gotten through several hallways. Even then, she only halted because something caught her eye.

In plain site on the wall was a quick-reference map for new employees. The dialect was a little strange for her, but she knew English and managed to figure it out. And it was the label reading "CEO Adrian Farenheights' office."

It was too big of a coincidence. She had no idea what CEO meant, but Dracula would certainly need an alibi and his son's name was as good as any.

Of course, Maria was smart enough to realize that at her best, she was nowhere near as good a hunter as Richter or Alucard himself and wouldn't stand a chance against Dracula. And she certainly wasn't at her best.

She would need help. Finding any of the others would mean trekking through Castlevania and worsening her injuries.

Looking at the map again, she noticed a room labeled "Special Weapons Lab."

---

"There should be an elevator after this… room…"

Barry couldn't finish the sentence if he tried. The next room was what they expected, a simple yet large hallway. It was what occupied the room that shook them to the core.

The small humans didn't bother Medusa in the least. The snakes on her head grew energetic and swirled around, as Medusa herself glared evilly at those who dared to intrude upon her.

"Jesus…" Claire gulped. "At least the stone myth isn't true," she noted. It was staring right at her and she wasn't petrifying, so there was that, at least.

And then a shot of purple light emitted from those grotesque eyes, hitting Claire dead in the chest. She didn't feel a thing, but she didn't have time to move as a stony color spread through her body, freezing her in place.

Barry reacted instantly, blasting at the ancient creature with his weapon. His shot went slightly wide and tore a snake from it's head instead of actually hitting her, and there was no visible effect except for the snake instantly turning to stone and falling to the marble floor.

Barry fired again, and again, hitting Medusa in the chest and triggering spurts of dark gray blood to pour out, but she started sliding closer on her slug-like body, and Barry had to jump to the side to avoid another blast from Medusa's eyes.

Jill, however, had an idea. Large, antique mirrors lines the walls of the room.

_It couldn't possibly be that simple._

_ _

But she wouldn't know unless she tried, so Jill dragged one of the mirrors across the floor, putting horrid scratches in the marble but not being able to care less. When she felt she'd got it out far enough, Jill stood in front of the old object and loaded her grenade launcher.

Medusa turned away from Barry when the more powerful weapon tore into her inhuman flesh. Jill was a larger threat, so logic suggested that she should be taken out first.

But Jill could dodge projectiles as much as Barry could, and she dived onto her stomach when Medusa tried her gaze trick on her. The purple ray lanced into the mirror and bounced right back, hitting Medusa right in the gut and spreading out a petrification past her torso and half-way across her base. What was left flailed wildly behind the new statue, either in pain, rage, or helplessness.

Barry raised his gun and fired one shot. All at once, Medusa crumbled into fragments, the living part flopping dead on the ground. At the same time, Claire regained her color and raised her grenade launcher, before she realized she'd missed the last couple of minutes.

---

Having started to believe that her detour was in vain, Maria let out a sigh. The weapon lab had been evacuated pretty quickly, as evidenced by the trashed look of the place. Things were simply messy, however, there was no impression that the room was ransacked.

Maria, however, couldn't find anything that looked like something she could use. Some things were liquids; one took up an entire corner of the room.

Something on a table looked promising. Walking over, Maria found a packet of papers next to an oblong, intricate looking metal object. The top sheet had a picture of it, so she began to read.

"Linear Launcher… stolen from Umbrella… shots tuned to disrupt non-human DNA," she read aloud, skimming the cover sheet. "Non-human!"

It was a start.

"Whatever DNA is…"

She flipped pages, finding a schematic of the weapon. Most of it was incomprehensible, but it showed her where the trigger and charge meter were. The light on the actual launcher displayed full power.

Satisfied, Maria grabbed the Linear Launcher and left, intent on hunting down Alucard's father.

---

"_They had a very nasty queen, the king was loved but oooooo… the queen was feared…_"

"You know I've grown to like the masterpieces of this century," Dracula thought aloud, his eyes closed, his chair facing his desk, his hand lightly moving in the air as if he were conducting the music. His suit was gone, replaced by the clothes and cloak of the old Victorian nobility.

"_Till I came strolling in his court and peril pierced the country port…_"

"Wesker said you'd like this one," Dracula added, opening his eyes and returning to his normal demeanor. "I thought it might help you think."

"Wesker has a perverse sense of humor. And I've thought enough," a voice behind him answered. It was clear the other occupant of the room had other things he felt his attention should go to. His gaze was fixed on the landscape seen outside the windows.

"_He lost his life and his lady love…"_

"I hope so," Dracula answered, touching his finger to a button on the arm of his chair. The unseen speakers stopped playing the original recording of Alexia Ashford's favorite song.

And a second later, Barry knocked in the door.

"Well that was fast," Dracula commented, rising from his chair. "My my my, so much company and so little entertainment. I guess we'll just have to make some ourselves."

"Yeah, let's," Claire mocked, raising her grenade launcher and firing. Dracula raised his hand, and the projectile shattered apart in midair, not even detonating.

"As amusing as that was," Dracula chuckled, "I have other things to do. I expect a visit from a certain vampire huntress and I really must take care of her myself. I'm sure you can see yourselves out. Out and into hell, that is, ha ha ha!"

Dracula faded away, vanishing into thin air, leaving the cloaked man behind him. And Chris Redfield's friends and sister would have half to have been pretty dense to not recognize him, even from the back, so he spun around before they could say anything.

Claire couldn't speak for Jill and Barry, but she could _feel _her jaw drop. Her brother's eyes, once a chestnut brown, were now a dark, blood red. Not like Wesker and Leon's, not slits like a cat or colored like fire, simply red. His skin was paler, and the vest he'd worn for years was absent in favor of the black vampire cloak hanging from his shoulders.

"…Chris?"

"You could say that," he answered, his voice light but having an air of wrongness to it. Claire couldn't place what was wrong with him, aside from the physical changes. Her eyes snapped to his waist as a low scraping sounded in her ears.

Walking past the edge of the desk, Chris drew a sword from the scabbard hooked to his belt. It was the etched white Mourneblade that Alucard had used. A malicious look painted Chris' face, and for the first time in her life, Claire was afraid of her brother. Gripping it in both hands, Chris slashed Mourneblade hard through the air.

And Barry flew, as if knocked by a battering ram, into the wall. He collapsed upon coming down, gasping for breath. Jill started to move, and Chris waved the blade in her direction, not in a mock attack as with Barry, but more as if the sword were a magic wand.The temperature dropped slightly, and Jill suddenly found all semblance of footing leaving her as she slipped and fell.

A patch of black ice had formed under her feet, and she had banged her head on the wall falling. It wasn't a serious injury, but she would be down for a minute or two.

"Sorry guys," Chris commented, sheathing his sword before looking his sister in the eyes. "Claire, come with me."

She was too shocked to do anything but blink. Noticing this, Chris flashed her a smile of understanding. It terrified her, her brother changed, attacking his friends… but to her, it was the same old Chris. He speeded toward her, seemingly floating above the ground, his legs never moving, the cloak never spreading back.

And the next thing Claire knew, her brother's arm was around her shoulder and the room was fading away.

---

Vlad's personal throne room was a perfect hideaway. An elevator had a hidden switch to reach it for the few normal people who knew where it was, and Dracula felt right at home inside. The room took up the entirety of Castlevania's highest spire, having glass picture windows in a semi-circle behind the throne disguised by holographic projectors on the outside. Inside, there were two tiers. The bottom was a few feet across and had an artificially maintained bonfire burning in the middle, over a painted rune, while the top circled at the spire's midpoint and took up a much larger amount of the diameter. Four flights of stairs led between the two levels.

Dracula didn't have time to contemplate the arrival of Chris and his sister in the room, because Maria Renard had found the place. She barged into the room through the door, although the other side of it was a hidden elevator. Being a trained vampire hunter, Maria was pretty good at sensing where her pray was located.

"You _bitch, _you've raided my weapon lab," Dracula yelled as he stood, unable to help himself as he saw the Linear Launcher in her arms. He could remember being curious about what Umbrella's anti-BOW weapons would do to someone with vampire blood. But that didn't matter now.

Unless she figured out how to fire it.

"Call me what you will, monster, we'll see who laughs last," she snarled at him, raising the energy weapon. Dracula leapt to the side as she pulled the trigger, and the blast of energy slammed into his extravagant throne. The smell of burnt fabric rose from the now charred piece of furniture, and it added to Dracula's anger.

"So, the little Belmont in-law wants play hardball, does she," he smiled, flinging back his cloak. It fluttered around of it's own will, shaping into a huge pair of bat like wings. Dracula promptly started to climb into the air with them, reaching into his own magic pocket and pulling a shining black, cross-shaped broadsword. Maria fired again, but Dracula was faster and he floated to the side, sending a ball of fire down in retaliation.

Maria dashed down the steps in front of her. By putting a smaller gap between herself and Dracula, she hoped to hide herself behind his own body. He had to look down, after all, and he couldn't look through himself.

But she fired again, and quickly found out that it wasn't going to give her a very big advantage. Dracula's fine-tuned senses let him hear her every step if he couldn't see her, to say nothing of the Linear Launcher's blast noise.

Claire instinctively stepped forward, intent on helping, but Chris put a hand on her shoulder.

"It'll be over soon," he said, assuming Dracula would win but almost sorry about.

Maria jumped back as a blast of lightning shot at her, and she returned fire without trying to aim. The plasma blast winged Dracula's leg, but nothing more. Maria had just about reached the end of her rope. Fighting Alucard had taken too much out of her to go directly into this fight, and the plasma cannon's weight wasn't helping.

Dracula pulled a death-black cross-shaped sword from his own magic pocket, and pointed it at the hunter. A blue bolt of power shot out, and for all her agility, it was far to fast for Maria to dodge. Claire watched in horror as the bolt's kinetic force sent her flying into the stairs, the Linear Launcher tumbling from her hand.

But there was more to come. The elevator door opened again, and Alucard himself emerged, with Barry, Jill and Leon filing out behind him. They scattered across the floor before Dracula turned in their direction. Alucard walked right ahead.

The dhampire kept walking, hitting the stairs Maria had fallen against. The Linear Launcher scraped the black marble as he picked it up.

"And my son is here to join my in victory," Dracula bragged, still hovering in the air. He hadn't seen the others sneak in.

"You and your kind don't belong among the living," Alucard suddenly shot, not paying any attention to his father's words, not noticing he was separating vampires from half-breeds like himself. "You're nothing but a visitor from the past! A shadow from the world of darkness," scowled Alucard, his voice bitter and resentful.

"World of darkness," Vlad thought he would fall right there as he realized where Alucard was going with his monologue.

"I'll send you back where you belong, Father, back to the abyss of _oblivion!_"

At that, Alucard raised the Linear Launcher and fired. The speeding bolt caught the middle of Dracula's right wing, disintegrating it instantly. He plummeted, the remainder of his enchantment forming into a scorched, ruined cape. Alucard pointed the launcher at him and squeezed the trigger.

_Click._

_ _

It was out of charge. He tossed it away as Dracula shrugged off his half-cloak.

"How _dare _you," he scowled, his son unwavering. "I've-"

"Shut up, Father," Alucard yelled. "You've no right to tell me anything, you've _no right to go about your freak plans, _but I was too deluded to understand that."

He turned and looked right at Chris briefly, as if he couldn't help it, and returned his gaze to Dracula. But Dracula was going to get in some words of his own.

"I've hurt no one, I've destroyed one of the most destructive group of humans in the world. I don't understand you, Adrian, and I think I need to admit I never will."

"Hurt no one," Alucard yelled, infuriated. "What of the Belmonts?! What of _her_?!"

Alucard raised his arm, and Claire was shocked when she realized that _she _was the one being pointed at. Chris didn't seem to care, but he drew Mourneblade silently, and without warning he jumped down and rushed ahead.

But Alucard wasn't ignorant. His own sword was in his hand instantly, and he spun on his heels, sending Chris right by him while knocking Mourneblade from his hands. Alucard caught the flying sword and sheathed his mother's.

Leon had no idea what Chris' problem was, but he was going to turn that problem into himself in a minute. He was caught off guard when someone grabbed his shoulder and spun him around. Wesker was all too happy to punch him in the face.

"Can't you just _die,_" Leon shouted, swinging his own punch. But Wesker was too smart for that. And Leon wasn't smart enough to control his follow-through, so when his arm overshot, Wesker gripped one of Leon's stakes and jammed it into his adversary's chest.

Leon screamed in pain, falling to one knee, bleeding like there was no tomorrow. Wesker had just missed the center of his heart, but Leon wasn't able to notice the difference at the moment. He managed to pull the silver from his chest just before Wesker kicked him in the face.

"You're damn persistent kid," Wesker chided, drawing the other stake. Leon was trying desperately to pull himself up and breath at the same time, unwilling to look at how bad the wound was.

"Well, it's been fun," the ex-STARS commented, raising his weapon. But Leon wasn't going to be beaten. As Wesker stabbed the silver down, he reached up and caught his wrist. Before Wesker could recover from the surprise, Leon twisted the stake around and jabbed it into his enemy's heart.

Wesker recoiled, shocked. Leon had been more on target, but his fading strength wasn't enough to totally impale his target.

Nevertheless, Wesker was suddenly worse off then Leon. Knowing when to swallow his pride, he hobbled to the elevator, desperate to get there before anyone noticed him. Leon tried to stand and stop him, but he just ended up toppling over again.

Sparks flew as Mourneblade struck Dracula's sword. Father and son were dueling, and neither had an upper hand. His anger never loosening, Alucard stepped to the side and forced his father backwards onto a staircase, bit Dracula didn't seem to notice the disadvantage having to walk on them meant.

The dhampire pressed on, but Dracula had lived and fought a lot more then his son had. When their swords met again, Dracula pushed his arm forward and caught Mourneblade's hand guard on the tip of his sword and flung it up.

Alucard lost his grip for a second, but Dracula couldn't push with enough force to seriously distract him. When he grabbed for the sword in midair, Dracula smashed the flat edge of his sword into Alucard's left arm, breaking the bone in two.

Grunting in pain, Alucard grabbed the sword in his right hand and went on the offensive. He was obviously at a disadvantage, and Vlad was all to eager to capitalize. His speed surpassed Alucard's, and as much as his son tried, he couldn't avoid the slashes that Dracula delivered faster then he could move.

Barry and Jill boxed Chris in on the upper level when he jumped away from Alucard and Dracula.

"We never _did _know when to stay down, eh guys?"

"What happened to you, Chris," asked Barry.

"What happened? I could explain what Wesker did to me, I suppose, but what happened, I don't really know," he answered, "I guess I started thinking that nice guys finish last."

With that, Chris raised his hand at Barry. Particles of air above the larger man's head froze and spun into a cone of ice, which Barry was smart enough to avoid by diving out of the way just before it came down.

Jill blasted the wall next to Chris with a grenade, hoping to knock him down, but all she did was shift his attention to her.

"Shit," she cursed, grabbing another round and reloading. But Chris was already striding over to her, and before she could fire, he grabbed her by the neck and lifted.

"Nice try Jill," he sighed. "Sorry about this."

With that, he released his hand and shoved his other at her stomach as she fell. He didn't quite connect, but Jill went flying into the wall nevertheless.

Wesker had almost made it when Claire spotted him. She quickly caught up and knocked the back of his head with her grenade launcher. He'd gotten the stake out of his chest, but he dropped it when she clocked him and it went rolling over onto the lower level.

She patiently let him rise.

"Bitch," he snarled.

"What the hell did you do to my brother?!"

"Done? What have I done," Wesker laughed, coughing up blood at the same time. "I've given him a gift beyond his wildest dreams. Immortality, power, I hated every second of it, but I swallowed my pride this once. You might say I owe Dracula one for saving my ass. Hell, your brother is probably as _powerful_ as Dracula by now."

"You're not serious," she answered, loading an incendiary grenade. "You didn't… how…"

"Oh I did, you'd better believe I did. And I'm a genius if I do say so myself, especially considering all the setbacks. Dracula's DNA wasn't enough to make it work. So I had Death steal the G-Virus to stabilize it, and the T-Veronica virus can't conquer the superior genetics of vampires, but that forces the virus to have the same effects that it had on Alexia without sleeping in cryo freeze for fifteen years/. In short Claire, your brother _is_ a vampire, not just half like me, by _artificial _means. And he _likes _it."

"Bullshit," she answered, aiming her weapon.

"Bullshit indeed! You think there's some kind of mind control at work? Don't be cliché. Truthfully I thought doing this to him would be our end, but your brother isn't stupid enough to resent something this good."

Claire answered by pulling the trigger. Wesker didn't have the strength to dodge the incendiary, and it exploded in his face.

Yelling in shock, Wesker jumped back and clutched his cheek, only to pull his hand away and get the surprise of his un-life. Small puddles of melting skin were running down his palm, burning and thin. Leaning forward, Wesker looked into the vague reflection the black marble floor gave off and was horrified to see that half of his face was literally melting from the small yet lethal payload of napalm from the grenade.

"Out of my way," Wesker downright commanded, pushing himself further and shoving her off of the upper level. He was still quite strong, and Claire flying. In an act of spite, Death's image on his back changed slightly; the reaper was giving the finger in the direction of Claire's fall. Slamming his palm onto the elevator button as soon as he was inside, Wesker was gone.

Grabbing the silver stake on the floor with the intention of shoving it right back into Wesker, Claire pushed herself up and gasped when she found her brother standing right in front of her.

"Hey Claire," he smiled, his tone having never changed from that of the protective older brother. "You don't look so good."

She didn't realize he was backing her into the wall until she touched it. It was actually the side of one of the stair sets, and she only had open space to her right. Not thinking clearly, she tried to dash out I the direction, but Chris was faster. He slammed his palm into the wall, stopping her easily.

"Well… uh… you wouldn't look so good if you plopped onto the marble from five feet up," she stuttered, wanting desperately, after all she went through in Raccoon and Rockfort, to get as far away from her brother as she could. The light of the bonfire gave an odd glow to his pale skin and rd eyes, but she couldn't shake the feeling that Chris was still Chris, same as always.

"Well actually I would," his smile broadened. "I heard Wesker spilling it. Neat, huh?"

He raised his forearms, almost showing off the cloak around his shoulders before he pulled it off and swung it around her shoulders, right over her vest. She hadn't paid attention to the slight chill in the room, it wasn't extreme enough to be uncomfortable on her bare arms, but Chris always _did _give her everything he could.

He put his arms on her shoulders. Claire tried to shrink away, but she had nowhere to go. And then he hugged her.

"Trust me Claire, I've thought about this _a lot. _I wouldn't be doing _any _of this if it wasn't for the best, and I promise you it is…"

He looked her right in the face once more and winked; "Hey, you know I always keep my promises."

He leaned forward again, but he wasn't giving her a hug. He was moving toward her neck. And as soon as Claire realized what he was about to do, she acted without thinking of the consequences.

Chris froze, his face contorting in pain when he heard the noise of flesh being stabbed. And when blood started to dribble from his mouth, he looked down to confirm that Claire had just stabbed him.

_Staked _him in the heart, with silver.

He looked at her again, his voice leaving him, his body going numb. Claire stabbed it in further as he groped at her hands, all the while his face pleading…

_...why?_

Unable to stand on his own as the effects spread, Chris fell into her. Claire caught her brother, his weight dragging them both down to the ground. His blood was drenching her vest. Claire couldn't look down.

She didn't know exactly when Chris died, before or after he slumped onto the cold marble, leaving her sitting on the floor, unable to even think.

"I will not let you continue, Father," Alucard yelled. But Dracula was only amused; they both knew he was winning. But Alucard went on. "And if this is the only way… so be it!"

Without another word, the dhampire pulled a coin from his pocket and tossed it to the floor. The old librarian of Castlevania appeared in a flash of light where the gold trinket had landed, and the man had an uncharacteristically huge smile on his face.

"It's ready Master Alucard! That spell book you told me to look in had it right inside!"

With that, he tossed a test tube-like vile to Dracula's son, the contents red and bubbling.

Ignoring the Librarian, Dracula turned back to his son only to receive a face full of the red liquid. All of a sudden, the old vampire started glowing a shade of magenta and an orb of bright colored light shot out of his body.

Alucard embraced the energy as it slammed into him. The entire castle shook slightly as Alucard convulsed, stopping as he regained control of his body. Dracula stood there dumbfounded.

"You didn't…"

"I did indeed Father, **I** am now lord of this castle!"

Enraged, Dracula charged his son. Alucard put up an effective defense, considering that he only had one usable arm. Dracula swung his sword hard, knocking Mourneblade from the lone hand of his son. Swinging again, Vlad broke the dhampire's leg as he had done to his arm.

Alucard went down hard, and Dracula raised his sword, ready to skewer his son like a pig.

"Tell me Father," Alucard spoke, not having anticipated this and desperate to buy time, to find some way of getting out. "You caught openings to attack me twice, and yet all you do is break my bones. You could have killed me the first time. Why haven't you?"

Dracula suddenly lowered his sword, much like Alucard had done when Maria hit his nerve. If he didn't know better, Alucard would have said the sparkle under Dracula's eye was a tear.

"You're my son…"

Something scraped on the floor and the Mourneblade was at Alucard's good hand. In the corner of his eye, he could see that Leon had toppled down to the lower level and, seeing his plight, had shoved the sword over.

Vlad didn't seem to notice, his face still a blank stare as if he was tearing himself up inside. Alucard didn't think about it as he grabbed his sword and ungracefully shoved it through his father's stomach and out the other side.

Shocked, Dracula stumbled back and dropped his sword. He gripped Mourneblade where it entered his body, blood flowing through his fingers.

"Nice… try… Alucard… but it's not… silver…"

Dracula laughed, not in malice this time, but in actual humor. Humor at his situation.

And then his arm snapped in two, while Alucard's healed. Dracula gasped in shock, not understanding what was happening.

"It doesn't have to be Father," Alucard answered. He stood, his leg healed. Dracula's broke, bringing him to his knees. The Mourneblade didn't stop there. It continued to steal Dracula's health, his skin wrinkling as Alucard was rejuvenated, his body needing rest as Alucard's fatigue left him.

"Goodbye Father," Alucard whispered. A realization came over him; he'd just killed his Father for a third time.

Dracula lost consciousness and finally, as the Mourneblade had nothing more to steal, his body and clothes turned into a dull gray color before crumbling into a pile of ash.

Alucard, having never felt physically better, walked over and claimed his sword silently.

He didn't walk three steps before he broke down and screamed, a long and resentful cry, wanting badly to not have destroyed his father but at the same time not wishing he'd done anything differently.

---

NEXT: Vice


	5. Epilogue

About halfway into 3c

About halfway into 3c, I realized something; this isn't needed. This is droning on. This is too much. This is using things just for the sake of using them. What if I want to do a sequel? ^_~ I'll need SOMETHING for it.

Most horribly, however, it killed this, the epilogue. I wrote the epilogue ahead of time awhile ago (the benefits of planning the whole plot beforehand) and I was proud of it. I still am. So, I pressed delete on 3c and I bring you this, the real, true, good, conclusion.

This has been quite a wild ride, and I sincerely hope you've found it worth using time from your life to read this. If you've been reading and are still interested enough to make it all the way here, thank you.

Oh, Mayumi_H and Red Kat 9, thanks for the ego boosting ;) Not to mention those MST reviews, Mayumi… but enough of me, onward!

Resident Evil: Demon Rising

Epilogue 

_ _

---

_Three months... Christ, it's been three months... _

_ _

Parking her motorcycle in front of the apartment complex, Claire continued to dwell on her thoughts. It was a bright, sunny day in New York City, but she wasn't bright.

She was still very much in the dark, almost every waking moment spent replaying those few seconds three months ago when she staked her own brother in the heart.

_Staked... _

_ _

_Like a piece of meat... like a vampire... _

_ _

_Like what he was. _

_ _

It was tearing her apart inside. She simply didn't know how to deal with it. Maybe it would have been easier if he weren't himself, if Dracula was controlling him somehow, like things usually are in horror stories.

But it wasn't a story. Wesker may have done… it… to him, Dracula may have made him an offer he couldn't refuse, but Chris acted on it through his own volition.

He wanted to do for her, his little sister, who deserved anything he could give her in his eyes.

Snapping out of her thoughts, Claire realized she had to stop stalling and get up. Setting the kickstand, she dismounted her bike and entered the building, climbing the stairs slowly. Her father lived on the third floor. Her parents had separated a long time ago; she would have to ask him where her mother was. She didn't want to tell either of them about Chris over the phone, she'd only called her father to make sure he would be home when she arrived.

_At least they won't hear it on TV... _

_ _

Of that much was certain. The latest news was the death of Adrian Farenheights, CEO of Castlevania Pharmaceuticals, and his replacement by his son.

They wouldn't know _why _"Adrian" had died, of course, or that Alucard was a willing puppet, using his "inheritance" to gain trust while taking orders on what to do every day by the US government. They weren't so bad, really, just making sure the company didn't start doing anything illegal again. With Umbrella gone, Alucard was head of the most powerful pharmaceutical company in the world.

And of course, they'd given Claire legal custody of Sherry. Not to mention a job. She had no intention of going back to college. The Associate's degrees she had weren't in fields where two years of study could merit a high paying career, but she needed to be out doing something. She needed to keep busy. And so, Leon recommended her 'services' to is superiors and got a partner.

Her key in the doorknob, Claire told herself to go on.

C'mon girl, be strong... you've accepted it, at least. Dad isn't going to believe me for a few days.

_ _

The key turned quietly. Stepping inside after opening the door, Claire made last minute changes to what she planned to say in her mind. She doubted any of it would come out like she planned.

"Dad?"

She turned to her right, closing the door. The living room extended in that direction, and her father's favorite chair was in front of the window. Sure enough, the chair was sat in, the newspaper was being read, although Claire didn't think her father liked wearing black jeans, she didn't really care.

"I'm afraid he went out for a few minutes," a voice that was most assuredly _not_ her father's answered. "Note's on the table if you don't believe me."

She never turned her head, staring at the stranger in the house as the newspaper lowered.

"You," she breathed, malice in her voice, disbelief in her mind as she saw she was talking to Albert Wesker.

Claire reached down to her boot and pulled the knife hidden there; wishing she hadn't stopped carrying a gun. She felt like everything was moving in slow motion. To Wesker, she probably _was _moving in slow motion.

She expertly flung it at him before she even raised… and Wesker grabbed the blade in his hand as it flew toward him.

He stood and quickly walked over to her. His wound hadn't healed and it was still hindering him, but he was quick enough to get in her face before she could think.

Claire swung a punch, and Wesker easily grabbed her arm. She tried with her other fist, and Wesker did the same.

"Now that's enough of that, be a good girl," he smiled. The side of his face was home to a couple of bandages; the injury she'd given him hadn't healed fully either.

He tossed her onto the couch.

Claire tried to stand, but Wesker leaned over her and pressed her shoulders into the fabric.

"Now now, sit still for a minute, I'll be gone before you know it."

"What the hell do you want," she tried to shout, only able to whisper.

"Heh heh, I just wanted to say 'thank you,'" he answered.

Claire's expression gave away that she had no idea what he was talking about, but Wesker was expecting that. He leaned closer, his lips almost touching her ear as he lowered his own voice.

"You see Claire, I've hated your brother for a long time. I wanted nothing more then to tear him limb from limb. Alas, he was the only guinea pig around and I had to give him a gift beyond his wildest imagination."

He pulled back again, still holding her down but face to face with her.

"And then you show up. And you killed him. Just like that. Because of what I did, Redfield's own _sister _killed him. I can only imagine the look on his face. It's a better revenge then I could have dreamed of. So thank you."

He stood, smiled, and walked out of the apartment.

Claire tried to stand up. But her face fell into her hands, and all she could do was cry.

---

**_~fin~ _**


End file.
